7 - Practitioner Study 2: James Cousins ‘Everything or Nothing’

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‌ I have decided to review James Cousins piece ‘Everything or Nothing’, (www.youtube.com, 2012) Cousins choreographed this piece for Mathew Bournes annual new choreographers award, which he won in 2012. This piece this piece is set on 10 dancers. It is about becoming aware of a concept, “With the single realisation that nothingness is a state of mind, we unlock the possibility to become anything that we desire. Without that nothing, we could not have everything”. (Bettina John, 2016). This piece clearly has different intentions to the first piece I reviewed ‘Taste Water Again’, which focused on the journey of a girl who seeks resolve in a situation that is beyond her control (Cousins, 2013). 


I believe there are great differences between the movement in the two pieces.  ‘Everything or Nothing’, overall holds more dynamic and sharper movements throughout compared to the contrasting sharp and flowy movements Cousins included in ‘Taste Water Again’. The music fuses electronic with classical sound, which highlights the obscurity of the movements Cousins created. It is similar in the way that when a few dancers dance alongside each other, they switch between dancing their own movements and dancing the same movements in unison. For example, at 1:15mins the two dancers stage right are doing the same movements, and the two dancers stage left are doing different movements. It then suddenly changes to each alternating dancer in the line doing the same movement. This satisfies the eyes of the audience and promotes engagement throughout the whole piece. Repetition of a series of movements is a common aspect to both pieces.




 

The movement in our solo is very different to the energetic movement's included in ‘Everything or Nothing’, but the contrast we included is very similar to that in ‘Taste Water Again’. The style of our solo is more balletic to that of Cousins pieces, but it is his way of using motifs and intention that directly inspired us while creating our solo.



Bibliography:

www.youtube.com. (2012). New Adventures Choreographer Award (NACA) | Winner, James Cousins. [online] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WRixTncT2QI&t=20s&pp=2AEUkAIBygUlRXZlcnl0aGluZyBhbmQgbm90aGluZyBqYW1lcyBjb3VzaW5zIA%3D%3D 

 

Bettina John. (2016). costume designer bettina john james cousins matthew bourne london. [online] Available at: https://www.bettina-john.com/costume-designer-bettina-john-james-cousins-matthew-bourne-london/ 

 

www.youtube.com. (2013). James Cousins Dance - Taste Water Again. [online] Available at: https://youtu.be/EqWgy8EMsY4?si=-H6ywBPmkytNYEdI

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