AMNEVILLE, France—The China that we see today is nothing like China portrayed by Shen Yun Performing Arts. Frédéric Ney, a Luxembourg civil servant, said that Shen Yun beautifully portrayed a culture with which he is unfamiliar.

“It was very beautiful. The costumes were very beautiful, the dancing was very beautiful, and it was spectacular with the acrobatics,” Mr. Ney said. “For us, it’s a culture we don’t know, so it was also interesting to learn a bit about Chinese culture.”

The instrument that Mr. Ney was referring to was the two-stringed erhu.

Throughout Shen Yun’s performance, traditional values such as filial piety, kindness, truthfulness, and loyalty are present on stage through dance. Mr. Ney said that these values are important to society.

“Those [values] are obviously very important, especially in the current context in Europe. And yes, it was interesting to see the values that were being shown,” he said.

“Yes, [Shen Yun] did also show communism. There were people wearing jackets—I imagine that represented communism. It seems that traditional messages are not really compatible with communism,” Mr. Ney said.