London - As a muse and lover of Pablo Picasso, she was objectified in the name of art.
When it comes to the everyday objectification of women, however, Francoise Gilot has some rather controversial – and bizarre – views.
The 93-year-old French painter and author has claimed men wolf-whistling at women in the street reduces the number of rapes committed because it “oils” the complex relationship between the sexes.
Miss Gilot, who had two children, Paloma and Claude, with Picasso, made the comments in a book which is released later this month.
About Women: Conversations Between A Writer And A Painter, which she co-wrote with US feminist author Lisa Alther, discusses the “dilemmas, benefits and demands of womanhood”.
On the subject of wolf-whistling, Miss Gilot says: “There are probably fewer rapes in France because people are less repressed. If a man whistles at you and you smile, that oils the social wheels and eases the tension between classes and sexes.
“It’s a kind of give-and-take that acknowledges that the other person exists, so in that sense it’s not treating the other person as an object.” She adds: “To take offence all the time makes every relationship disagreeable?...?if I smile vaguely and go my way, it doesn’t cost me very much.”
Miss Gilot also says French women don’t need to look in a mirror to see if they are in good shape because they can rely on wolf-whistles.
Explaining how she learned to deal with unwanted advances, she adds: “When I was 15 young men started noticing me, so I asked my father how to get rid of them. [He replied] ‘But I thought you were a woman?’ – meaning that I had to have the guile to find ways to refuse without saying no.” Anti-rape campaigners criticised her controversial views.
Sarah Green, of the End Violence Against Women Coalition, said: “If those men get a ‘no’ they will become abusive. The idea that it’s jocular or working class culture is wrong.”
Cambridge University-educated Miss Gilot was 21 when she met Picasso, then 61, in 1944.
In the 1960s, ten years after their separation, she wrote Life With Picasso, which her former lover tried to block in the courts. He also refused to see their children after.
Daily Mail