Artist Profile: Kexin Li

NEW YORK—Dance experts agree that stage image and expressiveness is often the hardest craft to master for any dancer.

It is also one trait that classical Chinese dancer Kexin Li has in spades.

Physical skill is a requirement for any dance professional, and can be trained over time. But stage presence, expressiveness, and the emotional heft a dancer conveys while on stage are crafts honed after years of experience and fine-tuning.

For Ms. Li, it just comes naturally. Her “elegance and natural stage image” are unparalleled, said one of her mentors at Fei Tian Academy of the Arts.

When asked in a recent interview with The Epoch Times how she prepares herself, she said, “You have to keep your inner self pure and calm, without any stray thought. You picture how to embody the characters, and you try to bring the audience members into the dance.”

“If you portray a heavenly maiden, you have to imagine how she carries herself, with all of her purity, elegance, and grace.” The ability to accurately and faithfully embody her characters—and in turn be able to capture the audience’s hearts—takes a lot of research, preparation, and practice.

Ms. Li has been one of the most prominent dancers performing in practicum at Shen Yun, a premier New York-based dance company whose mission is to promote classical Chinese dance, a dance form unrivaled in artistic history.

Out of all dance forms in the world, classical Chinese dance places particular emphasis on conveying the inner spirit of the characters. Born out of ancient Chinese imperial courts, Chinese classical dance employs unique postures, physical expression, as well as highly complicated leaps, tumbles, flips, and spins, all of which Ms. Li pulls off with relative ease.

No Fear

One particular dance in which Ms. Li sends audience members into frenzied joy is Snowflakes Welcoming Spring, a dance in which dancers must deftly twirl and spin sequined handkerchiefs—which portray pure snowflakes—into the air.

“I twirl the handkerchief into the air, do a flip, and catch it into my other hand,” she said. The coordination and timing, not just by herself but with other dancers simultaneously on stage, is a mesmerizing sight to behold.

“They were throwing and catching these snowflakes; you often have to blink to make sure you’re not imagining things, it was phenomenal,” said Samantha Simpson, a classical ballet school principal in Australia who attended a Sydney performance earlier this year that Ms. Li performed.

“We did around 300 to 500 spins every day,” she said, recounting the training routine in preparation for the “snowflake” dance. But she shared that although all the spinning and catching can be tiring, “how successful you are really depends on how calm your mind is.”

“The last thing you want to think about is making mistakes, or dropping the prop,” she said.

“A dancer really has to have no fear and no regrets.”

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