Her feet never touch the ground. That’s the premise of James Cousins’s Within Her Eyes, his breakout, award-winning duet from 2012. Made into a film in 2016, it’s the most substantial part of a new online offering from Cousins’s company, made of up three short films adapted from stage works.
The film of Within Her Eyes is atmospherically directed by David Foulkes and ex-EastEnders actor James Alexandrou. The two dancers, Lisa Welham and Aaron Vickers, are on a desolate hillside, dancing under low cloud in long, windswept grass. The setting emphasises the architectural qualities of the dance (as opposed to the emotional), with Welham suspended parallel to the ground, or held starkly aloft, its strong lines clear against the wide emptiness of the landscape. Vickers is somewhere between a statuesque, Atlas-like protector, and the lad carrying his girlfriend at the end of the night after she’s jettisoned her heels. Welham torques around his torso, or takes a big step into the void only to be pulled back at the last moment, her curled frame enveloped in his arms. The obvious symbolism is of a woman’s vulnerability, but actually it’s Welham demonstrating the greatest strength.
The power of the piece lies in its slowness and simplicity, its empty space (enhanced by Seymour Milton’s sparse, melancholic piano), the measured movement under completely even control. The limitations of the set-up mean it returns to certain images that anchor the focus, and the utter trust and careful equilibrium between two people is distinct, even as the light gradually fades into the gloaming and moody skies turn to a dark blur.
The other two films are very short, but show Cousins’s choreographic thinking getting more experimental. He’s a dancemaker strongly interested in storytelling and relationship dynamics, although the brevity of these promo-style films doesn’t always lend itself to going that deep.
The Secret of Having it All was originally a duet on the stage, but here it’s two minutes watching solo dancer George Frampton jump, jiggle and flex through a supermarket aisle and past bemused market stallholders on the street. An incongruous presence in skin-toned leggings and crop top, Frampton looks both a bit lost and like she’s never been more sure of herself.
As her torso judders to pummelling beats and she bends over, bum-to-camera, in front of shelves of yellow vegetable oil and giant sacks of rice, we’re definitely thinking about the performance of a woman’s body, selling her wares, but it’s all too short to get a real handle on. The odd juxtaposition of dance and setting and the unpindownable movement means the film has an impact, even if you’re not sure what that is.
Inspired by a poem by Sabrina Mahfouz, Clothes to Cover is a mere two and a half minutes, but more successful in its neat concept: a woman, Amy Hollinshead, pulling on the clothes of her ex, futilely trying to reinhabit that feeling of a lost love. We see her memories of the couple (Meshach Henry dances the ex), bodies and clothes entwined, merging, then Hollinshead alone in her flat, tussling with messy feelings and three layers of crumpled cotton. It’s just a sliver of a piece, but an entire story is there, given downcast, bittersweet mood by Gaika’s music. Altogether, for those who haven’t seen his work, these three films are a good introduction to the talented Cousins’ world.
View all three films through the James Cousins Company Facebook page.
• This article was amended on 22 May 2020 because an earlier version omitted to name one of the directors of Within Her Eyes, David Foulkes.
