These days, life moves fast. Amid the endless flow of algorithms and information, we rarely pause to look around—let alone inward. As AI therapy sessions, TikTok psychics, and an endless marketplace of advice about how we should feel begin to fill the space, even our downtime can feel strangely superficial. And when the inner life itself becomes just another product to consume, a more fundamental question emerges: what does it truly mean to turn inward, slow down, and be more intentional?

“For me, it’s about transforming my emotions into something else…something beautiful,” says musician NINA. At a performance in the 11th arrondissement, NINA alongside Cabaret Les Moches explored the notion of rituals and the many ways they inhabit both the inner-lives and outputs of these artists. At a time when femininity and womanhood are subject to constant scrutiny, their performances resisted the demand for composure. Instead, they embraced vulnerability as a conscious and deliberate act, one that pushes back against the contemporary politics of indifference.

“As women, we have to deal with so much hardship and heaviness,” reflects Mimi, a professional dancer and performer with Cabaret Les Moches. “When I perform, my goal is to let go and bare all of that on stage…for me, the most important ritual is connecting with my truth. Sometimes when you perform, you are expected to lie. You have to always smile or look pretty, but I want to let go of all that. I want to reveal my actual emotions.”

For these artists, the rituals embedded in movement offer a vital form of grounding, creating the very conditions where human expression, sensuality, and feeling can flourish. “Before becoming a musician, I was a trainer,” explains NINA. “So, I’ve studied a lot of body science, and before every performance, I practise pilates-inspired movements. I also take a few minutes to meditate and go over pranayama breathing techniques. All of this helps calm my nervous system and allows me to enter a kind of flow state.”

That said, NINA sometimes notices a tendency to let ritual slide into superstition or obsession. “To counteract that, I try doing things at different times to offset that feeling of being too programmed. As a musician, you’re hyper-focused all day on one evening performance. Your entire day revolves around it, and it’s easy to forget everything else—it can feel almost self-absorbed. So balancing that level of dedication with a sense of freedom is essential. Movement and athletics, I believe, can help with that. It’s all about finding a holistic rhythm, being kind and graceful with yourself while remaining fully connected to your goal and craft.”

For Awa Joannais, a former dancer with the Paris Opera Ballet and performer with Cabaret Les Moches, creativity itself is a form of liberation. “I love dance because of the freedom it evokes. To feel so deeply and express that through movement, without necessarily needing to use words, is incredibly powerful. Especially as a woman, our bodies guide everything we do, so to use them not just to move, but to create art, is beautiful to me.”

Yet for Joannais, arriving at that sense of freedom in movement was not immediate. It required a process of grounding, learning to strip away the weight of the external gaze that so often dictates how our bodies are seen and judged. Only through this process could she truly inhabit movement as a conduit for real vulnerability and expression. “As a ballet dancer, performance can feel very binary,” she explains. “The way most pieces are choreographed often gives men more space to express their individuality, while women are expected to blend into the collective. You are always asked to stand behind the girl in front of you—never truly seen. And for me, as one of the only women of colour in the room, this was even more pronounced.”

As a Black woman, Joannais was singled out because of her skin colour, carrying an unspoken expectation to erase herself. “Over time,” she says, “I internalised the idea that I always had to make myself smaller… to disappear a little. But now, as a more contemporary-style dancer, I strive to be fully present, to really know what’s happening at every moment of my performance. I want to feel all the emotions and the energy in my body. That’s why I warm up as much as I can beforehand, so I can feel everything and, afterwards, still reconnect to those sensations.”

During her performance with Cabaret Les Moches, this presence and clarity of mind were palpable in every movement and gesture. Her piece, choreographed by Paris Opera Ballet dancer and Cabaret Les Moches co-founder Axel Ibot, was a reinterpretation of the famous Dying Swan solo. The entire sequence was performed in reverse of its usual order, and she wore nothing but pointe shoes, her body covered in gold glitter.

“When I am performing that dance, I don’t even realise that I’m naked until I step on stage,” she says. “Of course, it feels incredibly vulnerable, but it’s also empowering to choose what I want to reveal to the audience…and to demonstrate how something as simple as nudity can be meaningful in art.”

Since its founding, this is exactly the type of environment Cabaret Les Moches has sought to create. “Honestly, it all began as a lie,” says co-founder Carla-Vladya Subovici. “Axel [Ibot] and I were just playing around with the idea of starting some kind of cabaret or art collective. Then it suddenly became real when a friend asked us to perform at an event.”

What followed was an unexpected merging of worlds. “As a dancer at the opera, Axel brought these incredible performers, and I gathered a lot of nontraditional artists from my work in clubs and event spaces. Together, these creatives from completely different backgrounds managed to create something incredibly authentic and beautiful.”

Across its performances, Cabaret Les Moches proves that beauty and imperfection coexist everywhere. No stage is free of flaws, and no single community has a monopoly on artistry. “We wanted to create a space where those boundaries dissolve,” Ibot explains, “where performers from every background can come together and be seen for who they are, not for what they do or where they come from…our line up celebrates the empowering beauty of movement in all its forms.”

For Medusa, a professional pole dancer and stripper, whose performance gracefully merges sensuality with athleticism, that empowerment is deeply rooted in her femininity. “I grew up practising ballet every day after school,” she says, “but as a teenager, the pressure became overwhelming…It turned toxic. You were always expected to hit a certain weight goal or your foot had to arch perfectly. If anything was off, you were told you had no future in dance. I was naturally lucky with my figure, but I saw the body image struggles it caused among my friends, and it was painful. Eventually, I decided to stop dancing altogether.”

Medusa soon realised, however, that life without dance felt empty. “For years, dance had been my escape. It was a way of expressing myself,” she says. “So when I moved from Switzerland to Paris at 17 and discovered pole dancing, I was instantly drawn to it. It helped me reconnect with dance, of course, but it also became a way to embrace my femininity and sensuality…to truly own my body and move it however I wanted. Unfortunately, as women, we all encounter difficulties. But owning your body, claiming your moments, and choosing how to express your energy is incredibly powerful. I mean, just deciding to try pole can be empowering, whether you’re doing it for fitness or simply to have fun in high heels and a tiny thong. No one should ever feel ashamed of that.”

This sentiment is reiterated by Dani, a former dancer with the Paris Opera Ballet School, whose drag performance as Perseo represented the ultimate expression of freedom in feeling and personhood. “When I am performing in drag, I feel like a diva,” he says. “I feel like I am healing that little boy inside of me, letting all of that energy and emotion out. Yes, drag is political, but at the end of the day, the people in the audience are there to forget what’s happening in their lives…to have fun. So, when I am performing, there are no questions of gender. As long as I am comfortable and confident in my own skin, that’s all that matters. When I know my steps and all the lyrics, or when I am in my wig and makeup, something inside me just transforms. I take a breath, walk on stage, and as soon as the music turns on…boom, I'm someone else.”

For both Dani and Medusa, ritual isn’t just about freedom—it’s about community and character building. It’s about connecting with the creatives around you, cultivating self-assurance, and finding the strength to keep going. “Of course, I want to celebrate my job and fight for our rights as workers,” reflects Medusa, “but it’s not for everybody, and I don’t want to glamorise it. The pressure to make money is exhausting. You’re mostly working night shifts, which can seep into your days and strain your relationships outside of work. And psychologically, it can take a real toll…but that’s why I love performing with Les Moches. They've created a safe space for me to unleash my creative energy, to experiment and explore without worrying about money, the male gaze, or the way I look.”

Rituals are, of course, personal, but they are also fundamentally shaped by the people around you. “One of the best parts of my job is that I get to work with so many women,” says Medusa. “Some are first-time moms with a baby at home; others are opening a business or buying a house. You see women doing so many different things, yet they’re all showing up, hustling, and getting their lives together. That resilience is empowering…and whether I am at the club or with Les Moches, it’s exciting to be backstage with the other performers. Listening to music, doing my hair and makeup, and fully pimping my character. That’s my ritual. Sure, I have bad days, but I still have to get on stage and do the work. When I’m putting on my look and chatting with the other performers, I enter a flow state. I become someone else entirely—but I am content, and ultimately, that’s all that really matters.”

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