Celeste Armonia | Teatro Duse

On Wednesday, February 18, 2026, at 9:00 pm at the Teatro Duse in Bologna, the performance Celeste Armonia takes the stage, featuring the Beijing Academy Chinese Classical Dance Company under the artistic direction of Zhang Haijun and Hu Huaibei.

China, one of the world’s oldest civilizations, enchants us with its extraordinarily rich culture and millennia-old arts. Traditional Chinese dance, employing scenic elements such as the fan, the sword, long sleeves, and ribbons, is a visual and poetic language in constant transformation.
In its present form, Chinese classical dance brings together two fundamental roots: dance accompanied by music (yue wu) from the ancient dynasties, reconstructed through texts and visual representations without the original music, and the theatrical dance of the operatic tradition, which developed between the Song, Yuan, Ming, and Qing dynasties and was refined into a sophisticated art form.

For over half a century, the Scientific Committee of the Beijing Dance Academy has methodically reconstructed this tradition, transforming ancient dances into autonomous forms through a modern approach inspired by classical ballet, contemporary plasticity (body rhythm), and the roots of Chinese martial arts.

On stage, lyrical and acrobatic dances alternate, inspired by literary heroes, the ethnic groups of China’s vast territory, martial rituals (from Wu Shu to Ba Gua), and the philosophical symbolism of Yin and Yang. 
This performance transforms the theater into a cultural bridge, offering an emotionally engaging journey into the heart of Chinese dance, where the harmony of movement becomes memory and future.