SHEN YUN PERFORMING ARTS REVIEWS

‘Very Inspiring, Very Inspiring’: Shen Yun Audience Laud Artists’ Stand for Freedom

Feb 22, 2025

WASHINGTON—Shen Yun Performing Arts was all set to open the first of two weeks of performances at the nation’s capital on Feb. 20 when the Kennedy Center Opera House received a bomb threat that same morning. The theater was evacuated and secured, additional security was brought in, and the show successfully went on.

The next day, Shen Yun held a press conference, shining a light on the latest in a long series of threats made against the New York-based performing arts company. The company has tracked these incidents for years and believes they are backed by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), which has named Shen Yun as a top target for persecution.

On the evening of Feb. 21, performances continued without incident, and audience members praised Shen Yun for both its artistry and perseverance in exercising freedom of expression.

Formed in 2006 in New York by artists who had experienced oppression by the Chinese communist regime and left in pursuit of freedom of expression overseas, Shen Yun is the world’s premier classical Chinese dance company.

Through music and dance, Shen Yun aims to revive 5,000 years of Chinese civilization, sharing with audiences the beauty of China before communism.

“It’s very inspiring, very inspiring, very enjoyable,” said Dennis Spyra.

“I hope that they are able to convey to the general public a concern of how this movement and this cultural exchange is being stopped by the CCP. And they only have the freedom to do this in our country, and I guess other parts of the world,” he said. But in China, “they will be persecuted if they are found to be part of this movement, which I think is very sad.”

While many audience members learned during the performance that Shen Yun could not perform in China because of the communist regime’s persecution, Mr. Spira said for him it had been the other way around. He had read about Falun Gong, also known as Falun Dafa, and then learned it was targeted by the Chinese communist regime, which has stated an overt goal to wipe out the peaceful spiritual practice.

Falun Gong was introduced to China in the 1990s and became popular through mainly word of mouth, reaching an estimated 70 million to 100 million practitioners within the decade. In 1999, the communist regime banned the practice, launching a violent persecution that continues today.

Mr. Spyra said he discovered that practitioners of Falun Gong founded Shen Yun and was interested in seeing a performance.

“I just think it’s wonderful,” he said of the performance, adding that he enjoyed that through dance, the artists could tell a story, and connect with the audience.

“You can see what effort goes into the dance and the emotional exchange between the dancer and the audience. They’re giving 100 percent. It’s beautiful,” he said.

Zach Vorhies, a software engineer and free speech activist, said he had also come to the performance through an interest in what was happening to Falun Gong practitioners.

“Falun Gong, Falun Dafa is a very important voice and all voices should be heard,” he said.

“The thing I like about the show today is that it gives a very unique perspective of China before communism. A very spiritual divine place where people thought that they came from the divine heavens, and that’s been erased by the Chinese Communist Party. It’s very important people to know about that history and that China wasn’t always the way that it was today,” he said.

“And that hopefully they will be able to return to their divine spiritual roots,” Mr. Vorhies added.

Traditional Chinese culture is a divinely inspired culture, and the communist regime has sought to destroy it over its 75 years in power.

Mr. Vorhies said he has been to China and understood how a totalitarian regime was “artificially manufactured” into the Chinese society, limiting people’s freedoms.

“Nobody deserves that, especially not the Chinese with such an amazing history behind them,” he said.

Reporting by Sherry Dong, Frank Liang, 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.