Business Owner: Shen Yun ‘Imbeds Into Your Psyche’

MELBOURNE—Business woman Jude Mayall came away from Shen Yun Performing Arts International Company’s presentation of classical Chinese dance and music a lot wiser from her newfound experience at Melbourne’s Regent Theatre on Wednesday, March 2.

Ms. Mayall, who owns and runs an Australian aboriginal bush foods company, Outback Chef, was sitting back enjoying the aestheticism of the New York-based company’s show.

Shen Yun carries the distinction of presenting traditional Chinese culture as it once was: a study in grace, wisdom, and the virtues distilled from the five millennia of Chinese civilization.

At the core of Shen Yun’s performances is classical Chinese dance with China's numerous ethnic and folk dance styles. In a collection of short pieces, audiences travel from the culture’s creation over 5,000 years ago through to the story of the oppression of the traditional cultivation practice of Falun Dafa in China today, that had Ms. Mayall fighting back tears.

“I think it's brilliant, absolutely brilliant. It's a great way to [express] through the arts," Ms. Mayall said.

"People can learn to understand a lot more about what's going on, because it takes into your emotions as well. It embeds into your psyche. Art expresses the emotion of the people of the time, whether it's painting, dance, music, anything. Now no-one wants oppression, everyone wants a free world, a free spirit.

“Now more than ever before, people are looking for spiritual freedom, because that’s what's going to satisfy us ultimately. To express what's happening or has happened in the past, and what is still happening now, through dance … I think it does come across brilliantly.”

For Ms. Mayall, her emotions were stirred throughout the performance.

“Sometimes it was exciting, and sometimes … this is just so beautiful,” she said. “I think the thing I really enjoyed, and really hit home for me, was watching the [dancers] more than anything else.”

Shen Yun trademarks include gorgeously costumed dancers, choreographed to match hi-tech digitally enhanced backdrop scenes, backed by a full orchestral ensemble playing a fusion of classical Western and Chinese instruments.

“It was just lovely to see the costumes,” she said. “This beautiful show where you've got movement, colour and form, you've got action; you've got a lot of really lovely things to see—a really worthwhile experience.”

Her enthusiasm was reflected in her voice. “You've got the music, and for me it was really easily digestible in that sense, because it was a mixture of East and West … so I could go with it very easily."

She said one thing she learned from the show, apart from its incredulous performance, was the messages imbued.

"It was really beautiful … there is one thing I know about Shen Yun is that there is a very strong message coming across and I can understand, and looking at it from that message point of view, fantastic," she said.

"From an aesthetic point of view, that was really a wonderful experience as well. You've got the costumes, you've got the movement, you've got the discipline of those many dancers doing so much on stage. Really spectacular to come and see."

Passionate about the Australian environment, its flora and fauna, Ms. Mayall’s business, Outback Chef, specialises in bush food. In her spare time and interest in botanical art, she learns more about Australian plants by painting them.

Reporting by NTD Television and Raiatea Tahana-Reese.