'Close your eyes and... dance: touch and vision in Argentine tango"

Confererence "Touching and to be Touched - Kinesthesia and Empathy in Dance" July 2011

abstract:

Tango is a social practice layered with etiquette, and vision is one of its primary aspects. For example the "cabeceo", a brief nod employed to discreetly invite, accept and decline to dance, has a fundamental reliance on the exchange of gazes between prospective partners.

But the central role of vision is challenged by, amongst others, the late tango master Carlos Gavito, who proposed the absence of visual engagement for the follower during the dance -if motivated by the dance itself-. The kinaesthetic intention of moving as ‘one heart with four legs’ can, according to Gavito, be better achieved if the sense of sight is not used or is made void in the follower. The skilful leader accompanies the follower within a firm embrace around the dancing hall and amongst the other couples, with legs and feet sometimes touching.

What is the relation between vision and touch in dancing and learning tango?
Drawing on my experience of teaching tango to people with visual impairment, I will critically engage with this problematic. I will focus on how the quality of moving without seeing enriches the dancing and how my practice of release based techniques and Japanese butoh provided me with fundamental teaching tools that foreground kinaestheticempathy over visual mimesis.

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'Close your eyes and... dance!'

presented at DANCE &  ACADEMIA, Moving the Boundaries 'Dance in Body, Dance in Mind' as part of Dancing Oxford 2011at Corpus Christy College, Oxford, UK 19.03.11

published in 'Tango Therapy' book in April 2011

published in ANIMATED winter issue 2010, Foundation for Community Dance, UK

'From languid violins to eletronic beats: Tango Argentino in the New Millenium'

presented at POPULAR DANCE AND MUSIC MATTERS SYMPOSIUM

at University of Surrey, 2008 UK

'Performing Gender in Milongas  of Buenos Aires'

presented at

'Body, Movement and Dance in Global Perspective' Hong Kong, CHINA

Dance Research Conference at Roheampton University, UK

Dance Ethnography Forum at De Montford University, UK

'Double One'

BA Dissertation, University of Chichester 2001 UK

INTERVIEWS with Junior Antonio Soares, 2001 London

and Leandro & Andrea 2000 Buenos Aires

published in 'El Once Tango Magazine', London

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Writing referring to the work of Adriana Pegorer:

Alanna Thomson Hayes, 'Butoh, Tango and Interculturalism: a case study on the work of Adriana Pegorer', University of Chichester 2010