SHEN YUN PERFORMING ARTS REVIEWS

Shen Yun Came From Dedication and Great Minds, Says Math Professor

Jan 11, 2025

BERKELEY—We’ve all seen the advertisements—a classical Chinese dancer leaps through the air, seemingly weightless and graceful, as she performs an impossibly flexible feat. That image had lived in math professor Lindsay Wylie’s mind for some 15 years, and she finally decided it was time to see Shen Yun Performing Arts for herself.

Ms. Wylie and fellow math professor Dominic Tardivel attended a performance at Zellerbach Hall on Jan. 10, and said they lucked out with tickets front and center with a perfect view of the stage and orchestra.

“I was like—let’s do it. I didn’t really know what we were getting into, but it was beautiful,” Ms. Wylie said after seeing the performance. “We were pretty lucky.”

New York-based Shen Yun is the world’s premier classical Chinese dance company, known for revitalizing the ancient art form as well as 5,000 years of Chinese civilization. Formed in 2006, Shen Yun’s mission is to, through music and dance, share with audiences China before communism.

“[It was] excellent, I loved it. I loved the live music; we were right next to the music,” Mr. Tardivel said. “I thought it was beautiful. The storytelling and the lights and how it works with the music was beautiful.”

Ms. Wylie was thoroughly impressed with the dancers, saying she had just told Mr. Tardivel she thought they were “exquisite.”

“I mean, they make it look easy—they’re flying through the air,” she said.

The dancers were technically brilliant and very expressive, Ms. Wylie added, noting the theatrical use of classical Chinese dance. Indeed, the ancient art form is famously expressive and well-suited to storytelling.

“They make you feel a lot of different things,” she said, from comedy to contemplation.

Ms. Wylie said in one of the earlier dances, emcees had announced the piece by sharing a principle from traditional Chinese culture.

“The contrast between things and how the outside strength comes from inner tranquility,” Ms. Wylie recalled. “And I thought that was really beautiful, and I felt like the dancers were able to convey that. It was very evocative.”

Mr. Tardivel commended the artists of Shen Yun.

“I’m sure it takes a lot of dedication to put something like this together; it takes a lot of great minds, from the music to the costumes, to the choreography,“ he said, adding he wanted to say to the artists, ”thank you.”

‘It’s a Visual Feast, It’s So Beautiful’

Also in the audience opening night at Zellerbach Hall was Christina Mueller, who saw the performance with family including young children and teenagers, all of whom were engrossed in the art and storytelling, she said.

“They all loved it,” she said, “because the storytelling and the artistry is so beautiful.”

“It’s a visual feast, it’s so beautiful—and an audio feast, everything!” Ms. Mueller said.

Ms. Mueller said the experience was particularly profound, knowing who the artists of Shen Yun were and the mission they had set for themselves.

As the emcees note during the performance, Shen Yun cannot be seen in China. The traditional Chinese culture, a divinely inspired culture, that Shen Yun brings to life is one that the current Chinese communist regime has worked to uproot through violent revolution ever since it took power in 1949.

Ms. Mueller, like many audience members, said she learned through the performance that the people of China—including those who left it like the founding Shen Yun artists who faced religious persecution by the Chinese communist regime—do not agree with the atheist Chinese communist regime.

The spirituality of traditional Chinese culture was one Ms. Mueller felt close to her heart, especially the idea that humankind came from the divine, she said.

“I feel that that’s a really important story and I think it’s beautiful that it is coming from a Chinese perspective,” she said. “Not from anyone else’s perspective, but Chinese people who love their country and culture telling their story about how they feel about communist China. That’s profound.”

“That is what art is supposed to do, art is supposed to be something that creates discussion and creates controversy,” she said. “I love that.”

Reporting by Gary Wang, Mark Cao, and Catherine Yang.

The Epoch Times is a proud sponsor of Shen Yun Performing Arts. We have covered audience reactions since Shen Yun’s inception in 2006.