The IAAL Company was founded in July 2020 in Lyon by dancer and choreographer Caroline Besson-Diatta, whose artist name is Lynn Diva. Her artistic universe is inspired by clubbing and hip-hop dances. She dedicates her creations to sisterhood, cultural blending and inner exploration. Her artistic work, rooted in vital energy and resilience, speaks to the humanity and power within each person. It reveals the full sensitivity of hip-hop and clubbing dances.
, which brings together the company and a school dedicated to clubbing and hip-hop dances: house dance, waacking, electro, breakdance, hip-hop and more. The project aims to highlight dances born from clubbing culture in the 1970s and 1980s, as well as hip-hop, on dancefloors that became spaces of freedom and resistance.
Dance Up combines transmission, creation and commitment, bringing together a community of more than 200 dancers through classes, workshops and battles.
Each year, Dance Up organises parties and a battle called Up to The Club, dedicated to dances from clubbing culture, namely house and waacking, bringing together around one hundred participants each time. Lynn Diva’s approach is rooted in an aesthetic shaped by the positive struggles led by Black, Latino and LGBTQIA+ communities in the United States, who invented these danced languages to make their voices heard and exist fully through movement.
Kassoumay (2026)
Creation for two performers
This piece, currently in creation, is conceived as a praise of resilience and peace. The duet was born from her encounter with Pape Salif Dieme, a b-boy and choreographer from Casamance. The two artists bring breaking, waacking, house dance and traditional Senegalese dances, Diola and sabar, into dialogue. Through these crossings between styles and rhythms, the piece becomes a sensitive exploration, both inward and collective, towards a state of shared peace. Kassoumay invites audiences to question the role of art in building peace, by creating connection, listening and coexistence.
CAST & CREDITS
Choreography: Caroline Besson-Diatta and Pape Salif Dieme
Music creation: Powerbeat
Lighting design: Amandine Robert
Set design: to be confirmed
Notre lumière (2021)
Creation for eight performers
Notre lumière celebrates the diversity of femininities, cultural blending and the inner light unique to each person. This light is called to radiate and multiply through sisterhood, play and the virtuosity of the performers. The choreographer highlights the technical richness and energy specific to underground and clubbing cultures, transposing them into a stage language that is both demanding and accessible. The piece also echoes the light of clubs, places that allowed racialized and LGBTQIA+ communities to express themselves freely. Through this work, Caroline Besson-Diatta urges each person to preserve their light, affirm their identity and draw from within the strength to rise, with pride, beyond social constraints.
CAST & CREDITS
Choreography: Caroline Besson-Diatta
Dancers: Orégane Le Nir, Cecilia Mambou, Florie Mongrédien, Lydie Plasse, Tara Daudré, Camila Gutierrez, Camélia Elena Neagu, Jade Pillon, Caroline Besson-Diatta
Caroline Besson-Diatta
Lynn Diva is a dancer, choreographer of the IAAL Company, teacher of clubbing and hip-hop dances, and director of the Dance Up school in Lyon, France.
Trained in classical dance from an early age, she practised the discipline for 20 years.
At the same time, she joined Cie Au Fait and Academia Studio to train in jazz dance and stage performance.
From 2005 onwards, she began learning so-called freestyle dances: hip-hop, house dance and waacking. She was captivated by the freedom and musicality of these disciplines, which are rooted in improvisation.
Photos © Fanny Desbaumes
CALENDAR 2026
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