ORANGE PARK, Fla.—Bill Gundlach, a retired citrus farmer, and his wife Susan, a retired painter, enjoyed Shen Yun Performing Arts at the Thrasher-Horne Center in Orange Park, Florida, on Jan. 29, after learning about the company from Epoch Times.
This was the couple’s first time experiencing the performance and they’re already planning to return every year.
“We had tickets last year [for Shen Yun,] but we didn’t make it. So, we insisted on coming this year and here we are. We loved it. It was fabulous,” Mr. Gundlach said.
The New York-based Shen Yun was established in 2006 by leading Chinese artists who had fled the persecution of the communist party. Now in the free world, these artists have a mission to revive traditional Chinese culture and bring to the stage through dance and music, the glory China before communism.
Mrs. Gundlach said happily that she would be recommending the performance to all their friends and family. As an artist, she particularly enjoyed the vibrant colors of the show.
“Absolutely beautiful. Beautiful, and I love the transformation between digital and reality. The way they fly away. Beautifully done. Beautifully done … Very magical,” she said.
“It made me think about spring, and life, and light. ... Very rich. Very luxurious, and elegant, very nice.”
According to its website, the company’s innovative 3D projection brings the audience instantly into the story “by extending the stage to infinite realms.” With flawless cooperation between projection and performers, this technology allows for “storytelling without limits.”
Reflecting on the spiritual aspect of the performance and the company’s mission to bring back China before communism, Mrs. Gundlach said she wished the real China would stay, adding that the state of China today makes them sad.
“China needs to come back. The real China. Yes. Not today’s China,” Mr. Gundlach added.
Prior to the communist party’s spread of atheism, spirituality and the belief in the divine were essential parts of Chinese life. Even today, Shen Yun artists meditate together daily and strive to live by the principles of truth, compassion, and tolerance.
More than anything, however, the couple was inspired by the spiritual aspects of Shen Yun.
Mrs. Gundlach said it was beautiful. It was the main reason that brought them to the show in the first place, as well as to get a better understanding of China.
“Because in my lifetime, I’m born in 1963, I didn’t have the opportunity to know China,” she said. “[It’s] really important, especially for Americans, to understand what [Chinese] culture was before we were born, before Mao.”
Mr. Gundlach, too, thought Shen Yun was an enlightening experience.
“It’s spiritual. … [It gives you] a feeling of awareness and empathy, sympathy, understanding of what was and what is now—the contrast between the two,” he said.
Shen Yun capitalizes on “how important it is that the past is recognized. We can develop and build on what was and maybe bring it back so that it empowers everybody,” he added.
