“It is a very sad situation when we see that [real culture] oppressed in various ways and, and people’s history denied,” she said, acknowledging some of China’s dark secrets depicted in the show.

“It was wonderful to see the Chinese culture and their stories of divinity and origin here in little old Adelaide,” Ms. Franks said. “It’s wonderful that this is shared around the world.”

Madeleine Neville, a senior consultant at Datacom was also one of the audience members in attendance, she said she had a  “phenomenal”  experience watching the performing arts troupe.

“For me, it’s going to be life-changing; I think I’m going to be remembering this for a long while,” she said.

She noted that  from the moment the curtain lifted, she sat in the audience in “amazement.”

“From the very first moment, every single dance, you could just tell that there was so much effort put into that and that it was perfectly curated,” she said.

Ms. Neville described Shen Yun as “a rich tapestry of Chinese history” that “would change the way” people look at Chinese culture in general.”

But the piece that moved her the most was the contemporary story titled “Insanity During the End of Days,” which left the senior consultant in tears.

Falun Dafa is an ancient Chinese self-improvement discipline that teaches practitioners of the faith to live by the principles of truthfulness, compassion, and forbearance. It has been targeted by China’s communist regime since 1999, with practitioners persecuted, illegally detained, and even killed for their organs.

Since its inception in 2006, Shen Yun has told stories of the persecution of Falun Dafa practitioners to raise awareness of the atrocities that have continued to take place in China.

“It really separates some [of the] current ideals that people have makes people reanalyse the situation and then get a new impression from that. So, it’s definitely sort of changing our mind about relooking into the culture and its history,” she said.