AUGUSTA, Ga.—On Jan. 8, Henrietta Wehrman, a retired acrobat who performed with Barnum & Bailey, and her daughter Julie Hicks, a retired physician, enjoyed Shen Yun’s evening performance for the first time at the Columbia County Performing Arts Center.
“I was so impressed with the athleticism of the dancers and the grace and the beautiful costumes,” Ms. Hicks said. “It was just an awesome experience.”
“The backdrop—the way it changed and the way people came to life from the screen—that was amazing,” she said. “The timing was impeccable.”
Shen Yun Performing Arts is the world’s top classical Chinese dance and music company. Presenting a brand-new set of programs each year, the company has been delighting audiences around the world since 2006.
The performance is comprised of a series of short pieces that take its audience on a ride through the dynasties and across the vast regions of China. Using classical Chinese, folk, and ethnic dances, as well as solo musical performances, the artists tell tales from ancient times to the modern day.
As someone who grew up in show business, Ms. Wehrman doubly appreciated the flips and tumbling techniques executed by Shen Yun dancers. She thought it was “absolutely fantastic.”
“Nobody could surpass [Shen Yun] as far as the leg extensions and the points and the hands—absolutely gorgeous. I thought the whole show was great. It was very uplifting. I loved the acrobatics,” she said.
“The whole performance was high level. All of the girls, all of the men, were excellent at what they did. They had a lot of style, very great positions, and it was really very good.”
Referring to the artists’ mission to bring back China’s 5,000 years of traditional values that were destroyed by communist rule and raise awareness for human rights issues in present-day China, Ms. Hicks said it made her happy to see that.
“I loved that [the show] was so joyful, and they’re helping the downtrodden. When the people were down, they lifted them up and helped them do better. I think that’s such a good message,” she explained. “The spiritual element [of the show] was very important.”
