(Clearwisdom.net) The second Shen Yun performance drew artists, dancers, and dignitaries from around the Jacksonville area on the afternoon of Jan. 31.

Dancer Says Shen Yun 'Expands the horizon'

Ms. Vongsay pictured center, with her friend and husband

Ms. Vongsay, who owns a franchised dance studio, found Shen Yun to be "so very beautiful, beautiful" with "elegant costumes and it tells a story and the history. So you walk out learning something. Definitely something that I would come back for."

Ms. Vongsay has a background in ballroom and Latin dance. "I could really appreciate the arts and some of the differences and the inner relations between the different forms of dance," she said after the performance.

She was impressed with the female dancers' skills during the performance. The "female dancers were phenomenal--great strength and control. Very flexible and very elegant. Very, very nice," she added. "I enjoyed it a lot." The performance, she said, "expands the horizon" for the arts and dance. "They are more grounded in a lot of things that they do," Ms. Vongsay added. "The technique was very good. Good and into action. So I liked it a lot--truly enjoyed it."

The male dancers' abilities were not lost on her either, "The male [dancers were] very, very good," she said, adding that her son "after he's born he'll be learning Chinese classical dancing."

Arts Director: 'The show is an amazing spectacle'

Mr. Erskine, an experienced sculptor and painter

Mr. Erskine, the Director of the Art League of Jacksonville was also at the performance. "The beauty of the dance and the costumes and the way they told the stories was totally incredible," he said. "The show is an amazing spectacle--it really was... The stories all got told whether you understood the language or whether you didn't understand the language, which is a wonderful thing."

Classical Chinese dance is the centerpiece in Shen Yun. Each performer goes through rigorous training in order to master each movement and form. "The way they danced [and] used the costumes to show feeling and emotion, and the way the colors vividly took over the stage was very impressive," said Mr. Erskine.

The flow of the performers are "something that as a painter and an artist you hope you can capture in your paintings and in your art," he said. "That's an art of dance and that's why dance is such a beautiful and unreproducible art. It just has to live and thrive on its own. The use of colors was something that I hadn't seen before," he said. "And the way they flowed and the sync--the way they stayed in sync [was] just absolutely gorgeous."

Chinese culture has many stories from antiquity until now that give important lessons and values. "The stories and the morals of the stories are timeless too. It didn't matter when the stories were passed on from--they held just as much value or more value today," he said. He also expressed that we, as a people, need to preserve our culture and bring it into the future - and that Shen Yun did an impressive job of that.

"It delivered on every aspect of entertaining and beauty and culture," he said. "I think anyone who has even a passing interest in culture, and beauty and arts should see this show--it's a fantastic show."

Adapted from:

http://theepochtimes.com/n2/content/view/28912/
http://theepochtimes.com/n2/content/view/28911/

Category: Shen Yun Performing Arts