“With Le sacre de Lila, Ismaël Mouaraki delicately stages male intimacy and vulnerability. With an exceptional cast, he enables a fruitful encounter between Morocco and Quebec, blending cultures and performers. His approach, based on ritual, proves to be coherent and authentic, supported in particular by a scenography that fully unveils its sacred character. The show reaches its climax in a sequence of beautiful duets performed by inspired dancers,” state the jury members gathered by the CALQ.
Ismaël Mouaraki, choreographer
Since 2003, Ismaël Mouaraki has continued his work within the company Destins Croisés, of which he is the founder. His choreographic creation reflects his obsessions as the guiding thread of a lifetime’s work: embodying the infinite facets of humanity. Whether in Loops (2008), the duo Slam en/Corps (2009), in collaboration with slam poet Queen KA, the solo RefleXction (2010), or group pieces Lien(s) (2016), oZe (2019), and Phenomena (2019), everything revolves around notions of polarities, control, domination, and the perception of the individual within the group. His latest creation, Le sacre de Lila (2022), brings together 10 dancers from Quebec and Morocco on stage to celebrate the sacred rituals of his home country.
An artist and entrepreneur in body and spirit, Ismaël Mouaraki surrounds himself with artistic collaborators whose talent and expertise inspire his passion and vision. Human connections allow him to shape and develop a unique signature, rooted in the openness of genres and the discovery of others. For him, dance is a vector of social phenomena and the human condition: when Ismaël Mouaraki begins a research process, it is to discover the imprints left by our cultural and social environment, which inevitably sculpt our bodies.