In her latest work, Ceci N’est Pas Un Viol, which translates to This is Not a Rape, former Columbia University student Emma Sulkowicz, has posted a video of her having sex with an actor, which she warns “may resemble rape.” The video is preceded by a written explanation and a list of questions asking the viewer to introspect on their own motives and desires.
Former Columbia University student Emma Sulkowicz released this latest art project online in June 2015. Her earlier performance artwork, Mattress Performance (Carry That Weight) was a protest performance aimed at drawing attention to the insensitive treatment meted out to college campus rape victims by their universities.
Sulkowicz alleged that a fellow student had raped her in her dorm room in 2012 and she announced that the Mattress Performance would continue till he was expelled from, or left the university. He continues to maintain that the sexual encounter was consensual. The performance began in September 2014 and went on until May 2015, when both of them graduated.
The new video has received support as well as faced flak online. But, the key here is that it is not the video itself that serves as the art — it is the reactions of the viewers and visitors to the page.
Ceci N’est Pas Un Viol is not about one night in August, 2012. It’s about your decisions, starting now. It’s only a reenactment if you disregard my words. It’s about you, not him.
— Emma Sulkowicz
Sulkowicz lists some preconditions to the viewer: she asks them not to watch if their “motives would upset me, my desires are unclear to you, or my nuances are indecipherable.” These pose as her conditions for consent.
And to those who watch the video without meeting her preconditions, she says, “If you watch this video without my consent, then I hope you reflect on your reasons for objectifying me and participating in my rape, for, in that case, you were the one who couldn’t resist the urge to make Ceci N’est Pas Un Viol about what you wanted to make it about: rape.”
The comments under the video are a mix of support, hatred, blatant dismissal of her rape allegations, and often, attacks on her character. Her motive is to turn a mirror on the commentator.
The project has ignited several debates about the image of a perfect rape victim, the question of what is rape and even what constitutes art.