Hi, nice to meet you. I have a few comments about what you wrote. First, this whole Mouchette thing made me uncomfortable, but reading your comments really made me ask myself why. Anyway, here it goes. My proverbial two bits.

"I feel like the approach of the piece is an attempt
to make the viewer see the girl at the level of an abuser- by sexual
titilation, invitation, and winks and nods, at the expense of that humanism,
and I still stand by my take that this is an irresponsible concept to be
throwing out, this idea of "invitational molestation."


Maybe that's the point? Maybe the artist(s) are trying to draw the viewer into the mindset of not exactly a pedophile, but a whole culture that flirts with something close to it and pretends it's just part of being a girl, and to underscore how casually girls are debased, how "irresponsible" we are in our representations of girls? Cute can become sexy rather quickly (thinking Jonbenet here). But in whose mind? The child, parent, observer?

How would you do it responsibly? It is something irresponsible, this view of women. I think of Mouchette as a way to throw that irresponsibility back in the public's face.

"Something I don't like about Mouchette is her resignation to victimhood, and
the invitations to perpetuate that victimhood. I have to ask why it begs the
viewer to participate in that abuse and why it is considered "fun" to do so."

Maybe I'm wrong, but my answer to this goes along with what I said before. Some things are ugly, they make one feel ugly inside. Why should the viewer be spared this? Sometimes, there is no happy ending. A nice educational experience in which everything is neatly resolved is more than the audience deserves sometimes. Why should thousands of REAL Mouchettes suffer, while the viewer gets off feeling like a decent human being for thinking whatever was done to her was a bad thing, but not doing anything other than think its wrong. Can anyone do anything other than that in most circumstances?

"consequences are not
"dire," in fact, it's presented as an entire culture of fun and good times
to be had by all. Her suicide is not a "consequence," it's "a party."

I think that's the point. Good times for one person or group=misery for another person or group.

"I
believe the piece itself does not deliver what it needs to deliver in order
to overcome the initial problems it poses- it becomes a caricture of
victimhood, instead of a real response to it. Mouchette is entirely defined
by her victimhood; it makes up her entire identity."

That's what happens to some victims. It does. People don't like to imagine this. Why is the story of the victim who rises above her victimization the only story that's acceptable? What about the person who can't escape it. What about the person who doesn't want to escape it? That person isn't allowed a voice just because it's disturbing?

I don't know what the artist's real intent is here. What I think that intent could be may say more about me than about the artist.

It's late; so I'll say goodnight for now.

A