Zahira Mous holds a Master of Fine Arts in Dance and a Graduate Certificate in Women’s & Gender Studies from The University of Oklahoma (US) and a Bachelor of Theatre in Education from Noordelijke Hogeschool Leeuwarden (NL). Zahira is the director of dance theater company Project Zahira with a home base in Amsterdam, founded and ran the dance education outreach program Changing Lives Through Dance, and is the founder of the non-profit Healing Arts Foundation.Zahira has shown her choreographic works and facilitated her dance improvisation & embodiment workshops internationally in the United States, the Netherlands, Brazil, India, Greece, and most recently in Palestine. She has also been invited internationally as a jury on dance competitions, such as the Oklahoma International Dance Festival, Solocoreografico (USA edition), and AmsterDans (NL). As a choreographer, Zahira has been greatly inspired by the late German choreographer Pina Bausch. She creates works that seamlessly merge dance and theater. With an interest of creating empowering experiences, she derives from her dancers’ personal stories. Overarching themes of (the search for or the peeling away of) identity seep through Zahira’s dance theater works - with an emphasis on social awareness regarding gender identities, gender (in)equality, and women empowerment. Zahira works with professional performers as well as with people that seek emotional freedom in life through movement. She's made the following productions (a selection): The Rite (2023), Soul Famine (2022), Reclaiming the Goddess (2019) and Who am I without my Story? (2017). Zahira developed her own movement method called Art in Motion - a healing practice of movement & creativity, in which the participant is invited to listen to the wisdom of their body through dance improvisations, guided meditations, and creative assignments. People leave the workshop feeling more alive and connected to themselves with new personal insights.Zahira also works as a writer and journalist for Theaterkrant. And she has been a production manager for Stichting Kunst en Dialoog, the Aerialettes, Stichting Ropes Aligned, and is assistant-director to AmsterDans International Competition.www.zahiramous.comwww.projectzahira.com