French-Algerian choreographer and artistic director Abou Lagraa (born 1970) was born in the French town of Annonay. At the age of 16, he decided to become a dancer and studied at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse in Lyon. He began his career as a dancer with Rui Horta in Frankfurt and later worked as his assistant for a project with the Gulbenkian Ballet in Lisbon. In 1997, Lagraa founded his own company Compagnie La Baraka. A year later, he won the second prize in the contemporary dance category of the Concours International de Danse Contemporaine in Paris. In 2009, he received the award for Best Male Dancer from the German festival Movimentos. His work was performed at the Lyon Dance Biennale and as an internationally acclaimed dancer and choreographer, he travelled the world. With support from the Algerian Ministry of Culture, the Algerian National Ballet and the French government, he started a long-term project, Pont Culturel Méditerranéen Franco-Algérien, aimed at artistic and cultural exchange between Europe and Africa.