GOLD COAST, Australia—On Feb. 25, sales director Stephen Chungue and his wife, Leela, a counseling manager, enjoyed a spectacular evening at Shen Yun Performing Arts’ opening performance in Australia at the HOTA Home of the Arts.
Mr. Chungue was full of praise for the beauty and precision of Shen Yun’s performers.
“I thought it was very precise and very spectacular, very good. The colors, the costumes, the dances were very well presented,” he said.
“The show, overall, was really, really engaging. The music, the whole stage, and the screen was really cool too,” he said of Shen Yun’s patented special effect that sees its characters on stage magically jump in and out of the backdrop.
Mrs. Chungue agreed. She thought “it was a wonderful experience” and “lovely to watch.”
Based in New York, Shen Yun’s artists are masters of classical Chinese dance, an ancient and highly expressive art form dating back thousands of years. Unlike the modern, military-influenced styles often seen in China today, Shen Yun preserves and performs classical Chinese dance in its most authentic form, as it was originally passed down through generations.
The artists’ mission is to revive China’s 5,000 years of traditional culture and showcase to the world the beauty and goodness of “China before communism.”
Mr. Chungue particularly enjoyed Shen Yun’s story-based dances, which recount legends from ancient times to the present-day. Though there was no spoken dialogue, Mr. Chungue had no difficulty interpreting the characters’ emotions and following the storylines.
“The stories were good. Very good stories and easy to follow through the dancing as well. The dancers told the story [through movements] and the orchestra also helped,” he said, adding that he thought the artists’ mission is “very important.”
“It’s very important to know what the old values were back then,” Mr. Chungue said. “A lot of the message was around peace and harmony—that’s what I interpreted. A very friendly culture.”
Reflecting on the piece that raised awareness about the Chinese Communist Party’s persecution of people of faith, Mr. Chungue said he appreciated that the artists were “telling different sides of the story of how some people were oppressed and how they overcame that.”
The couple said they would recommend the performance to their family and friends.
“They gave us an opportunity to understand and to experience,” Mrs. Chungue said. “I think anybody that was in the audience was very appreciative. It all came together in a very beautiful, harmonious experience.”
