COLUMBUS, Ga.—Mark and Maureen Hastings saw Shen Yun Performing Arts on March 17 at RiverCenter for the Performing Arts.

“Athleticism is fantastic and of course the music,” Ms. Hastings, a pianist, said.

One instrument that shone under the spotlight was the two-stringed erhu.

“I like the two string [erhu],” Ms. Hastings said, who shared that she used her opera glasses to take a closer look at the instrument and the musicians. “She was very good. I didn’t know you could make that many sounds out of it.”

Shen Yun, based in New York, is on a mission to remind the world of “China before communism,” and revive people’s connection with 5,000 years of Chinese civilization and culture.

“This is fantastic. Americans don’t know what really went on in China. And I didn’t realize it was until 1949 that the bad guys came in,” Ms. Hastings said of communism, which was an ideology introduced from Soviet Russia.

Founded in 2006, Shen Yun was established by elite artists who fled persecution under the Chinese Communist Party.

“You guys don’t want communism. Nobody wants communism. Ask anybody in a communist country, they don’t want it. Glad you came,” Ms. Hastings said.

Torre Worley, a business owner, was also in the audience.

“It’s the most beautiful show I’ve seen in decades. The color, the action, and the message, the hope; it’s just awesome,” he said.

Although Shen Yun is sharing the beauty of authentic Chinese culture with the world, Shen Yun is unable to perform in China.

“This developed over 5,000 years of Chinese culture. It’s only been in the last 100 or so that the communist party has taken over the politics and the society, or attempted to take over the culture of the Chinese people. And that’s the crime, that’s the travesty. And I think more than anywhere, this dance should be available in China,” Mr. Worley said.

In one scene that portrayed the persecution of Falun Dafa practitioners in modern day China, Mr. Worley noticed the details that Shen Yun put in the backdrop.

“It was not lost on me in the scene where there was a stone wall and the cars parked along. There’s a surveillance camera mounted on the wall—a reminder that there’s always surveillance in China.”

He also noticed the “dancers in the black with the red hammer and sickle and how they treated people.” But ultimately, he saw how Falun Dafa practitioners “overcame that oppression” by holding onto their faith in the divine.