Shia LaBeouf Claims a Woman Raped Him During Silent Performance Art Show
by Andy Neuenschwander
As if Shia LaBeouf's performance art piece couldn't have gotten any weirder.
The actor claims that, during his #IAMSORRY performance art piece last year, a woman raped him while both of their significant others stood outside.
During the piece, LaBeouf sat in a room with a paper bag over his head and silently interacted with attendees, who were welcome to use any a prop of their choice.
"One woman who came with her boyfriend, who was outside the door when this happened, whipped my legs for 10 minutes and then striped my clothing and proceeded to rape me," LaBeouf said in an email interview. "Then walked out with her lipstick smudged to her awaiting boyfriend, who I imagine was quite hurt by it. All this happened in front of hundreds of people."
LaBeouf was dating "Nymphomaniac co-star Mia Goth at the time, and he claims the unwanted sexual act hurt their relationship.
"Yea it was no good," he wrote. "Not just for me but her man as well. On top of that my girl was in line to come see me because it was Valentines Day & I was living in the gallery sleeping in a sleeping bag for the duration of the event - we were separated for 5 days, no communication so it really hurt her as well as I guess the news of it traveled through the line. She was only about 25 people back. All encounters were one person at a time but there were hundreds of people in line when she walked out with disheveled hair and smudged lipstick."
Already people are up in arms about LaBeouf's use of the word "rape" to describe the incident. On the one hand, he certainly did not consent verbally to the act, since he wasn't speaking to attendees. On the other hand, had he been willing to halt his performance, he could have denied to consent at any time.
LaBeouf didn't even stop the performance to explain to his girlfriend. "When she came in she asked for an explanation, and I couldn't speak, so we both sat with this unexplained trauma silently," he said. "It was painful. The hardest part of the show. It fucked our Valentines Day."