AUSTIN, Texas—The moment the curtain opened on Shen Yun Performing Arts at Austin’s Long Center for the Performing Arts, the audience was presented with a scene of stunning beauty.
“Beautiful, the color was beautiful, dazzling,” said Jane Papadaki, one of the enthusiastic audience members who saw Shen Yun Performing Arts World Company on its opening day on Dec. 26 in Austin. Shen Yun’s other company, Shen Yun Performing Arts New York Company, also had an opening show in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. on the same day. Shen Yun has four companies that perform in different parts of the world simultaneously.
New York-based Shen Yun, the world’s premier classical Chinese dance and music company, embarks on a global tour each year starting in late December, treating audiences worldwide to masterfully choreographed dances, a unique orchestra that blends East and West, and dazzling animated backdrops.
Ms. Papadaki, vice president of global strategic marketing and sales at a leading biotechnology company, was intrigued with the colors in Shen Yun.
“Absolutely stunning. The colors are so vibrant and the mixture of colors is just beautiful,” she said.
Formed in 2006, Shen Yun aims to revive China’s divinely inspired culture. Shen Yun’s performances feature dance pieces showing heavenly realms and ancient legends, as well as modern heroic tales. One such tale is that of the Falun Dafa adherents, a group who practice spiritual meditation and have been persecuted severely by the Chinese Communist Party in present day China.
Commenting on the piece The Power of Compassion which shows the persecution in China, Ms. Papadaki said, “It was very beautiful, that there is suppression and [authorities] trying to shut down … the spirituality, but that the goodness … overwhelmed the badness of the suppression, the authority, the police force.”
Ms. Papadaki has traveled to China in the past as part of a U.S. Department of Commerce mission. Being on a political visit to China, she said she was only shown one side of the story. “[The trip] was political, so everything was very wonderful and nobody speaks about suppression, but of course here [in the U.S.], we know that that happens,” she said. Therefore, seeing the persecution presented in a dance performance was very interesting for her.
“The good overpowered bad; very touching,” she said about the dance piece.
With reporting by Sherry Dong
New York-based Shen Yun Performing Arts has four touring companies that perform simultaneously around the world. For more information, visit ShenYunPerformingArts.org
The Epoch Times considers Shen Yun Performing Arts the significant cultural event of our time. We have proudly covered audience reactions since Shen Yun’s inception in 2006.
