[Tango-L] Fame and photos

[Crrtango@aol.com]

Lois Donnay wrote:

< As I prepare to go in for my photo shoot today, I am reminded of the time I
brought Susana Miller here for a weekend of workshops. In order to create a
brochure, I asked her to send me a photo. She said she didn't have one. I
thought that surprising coming from one of the best known and most
influential Argentine teachers.>

This will probably get some sparks flying but I'm used to that.   :-)

Not that I disagree with Susana's sentiment of tango being something felt, 
not seen, but not having pictures shouldn't really be a surprise. Perhaps she 
didn't have photos because maybe she wasn't as known or as influential as she 
was touted to be. "Best known and most influential" is a matter of opinion and 
relative to one's experience (or lack thereof) in tango.   Susana Miller was 
hyped and touted here as an influential teacher by certain people who somehow 
consider "close embrace" as a separate and unique style of tango.  Because so 
many people in the U.S. teach performance and stage tango (i.e. open embrace) 
instead of traditional social tango, which is what "close embrace" is basically, 
she seemed like a novelty. Older dancers here and especially milongueros and 
milongueras in Buenos Aires saw that she was just teaching what they had been 
doing all their lives. I and some others here in New York were also not 
impressed, either by her execution or her style. She just seemed like another 
typical social dancer. Not bad, but not great and her execution and technique left a 
lot to be desired. 
This is not a reflection on her because she was rather humble and pleasant to 
dance with but she may have not had photos because she really didn't consider 
herself that important down there. It doesn't take much to impress 
aficionados of tango here in the states. Although there are certainly good dancers and 
teachers here, we have mediocre (or even worse) dancers from Buenos Aires come 
through New York all the time who manage to impress people and sell classes 
and start milongas. Some of them didn't even learn it until they came here!   
Some still haven't learned it!   We have a handful of them here right now. 
I don't mean to disrespect Lois' regard for Susana but I wanted to put a 
little perspective on why she may have not had photos.
cheers
Charles


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