NEW YORK CITY—Douglas Rose had seen Shen Yun Performing Arts with family in Georgia, and knew he had to share it with his wife and mother-in-law when he returned home to New York.
On April 11, the three saw Shen Yun at Lincoln Center and expressed great admiration for what the artists of Shen Yun had accomplished.
“It’s a treasure,” said Mr. Rose, who works in IT. He wanted to convey to the performers: “It’s an absolute treasure what you’re doing.”
New York-based Shen Yun is the world’s premier classical Chinese dance company. Through
music and
dance, Shen Yun’s mission is to revive 5,000 years of Chinese civilization, sharing the beauty of China before communism.
“It was the most incredible performance. I mean, incredible grace and really to a superlative level. Just an amazingly inspiring and divine performance, really. I mean, overwhelmingly. I’m speechless,” Mr. Rose said. “The music,
the orchestra is first rate, yes. And the way they blend both Chinese and Western instruments is really a unique combination. Really, never anything like it. And the singing, the soprano, the whole thing, it was just an incredible treat.”
Mr. Rose found in the traditional Chinese culture countless universal themes.
“It shows that Western and Eastern religions share the same common belief, you know, in both evil and truth and redemption. And so that really, it shows that there’s a common thread through humanity,” he said. “It shows that there’s been a long tradition between East and West, too. So it’s fascinating.”
Mr. Rose said
Shen Yun was a meaningful event for the three of them, who have mingled closely with the Chinese American community in Flushing for decades and felt a closeness to the culture, once nearly lost to the modern communist regime. His wife, Natasha Rose, said her mother, Janet Eisenman, a retired designer, is Ukrainian and had escaped communism.
“We have a great respect for that culture. It’s really very impressive. And to think that they [the artists] can stand up to the communists, me as an American, I can really appreciate that,” Mr. Rose said.
As many audience members learn during the performances, Shen Yun cannot perform in China, where it is banned by the Chinese communist regime, which has sought to try to stop
Shen Yun performances worldwide. Such interference has gone back more than a decade, according to Shen Yun, whose members have documented incidents since around Shen Yun’s inception in 2006. More recently, threats linked to the regime have become more pronounced, and 1,500 Shen Yun artists and family members have called on the U.S. government to investigate.
“That’s something that means a lot, that they stand up for religious freedom,” Mr. Rose said. To the artists, he wanted to say, “Please keep up the good work.”
“ It’s just so impressive that they devote their lives to this. And it shows their dedication to it. The fact that they have their school. We only hope the best for them, really. Please continue,” he said.
“I'll be back again, for sure,” Mr. Rose said.
Reporting by Yeawen Hung, Weiyong Zhu, and Catherine Yang.
