A video interview with Mistress Josephine, August 1997
Interviewer: Clara Mannheimer
Projection 1: The interview was also made as text, there was a copy for each visitor.



A Dominatrix is a woman, or somebody impersonating a woman that will take control. I'm a professional mistress, they come to me, they give me money, they are dependent on me for a certain time. It's framed. It's in a very safe context.

Fantasies can exist in your mind or fantasies can be played out.

We have the spreader bar. I can suspend somebody from that, I can hang them from it, I could just have their arms up so I can whip them. I can have them in a dogcollar and then have a leash attached so they couldn't run away. I like to put people into a strange head space, to be somewhere that's kind of different and odd and sort of almost disorienting.

That schooldesk is for schoolboys and girls that need to take their class and they have to sit there and sometimes I make them write: I will remember to bring my homework to class. That is fun, I love that schooldesk because it really brings a lot of memories having to sit there. It's very comforting and makes you feel very small. So, I really like that desk a lot and I get to loom over people and pace back and forth and make sure they are paying attention to their lessons. Usually there is some punishment involved, for having a pornographic magazine in the desk, which I always find because it's planted there, for staring at my legs, or whatever, just because I feel like it, just because I'm a bitch.

I think you are really beautiful. How does that make you feel when I say that? It makes you feel like Oh! (she puts her hand on her chest). Or, I think you look really fat today.

If there is an abusive boss that is scolding you like you are an idiot or talking to you like you are stupid that's different than if somebody comes to me and I do it to them because that's what they want.

One of the things that most submissives like is for the dominant to really loom over them so if they are lying on the floor and I'm walking over them I appear to be very large. Like: there is this bigger than life person that has God-like power. It's like being a child.

I do infantilism. I play with people and I make them into babies. I take care of them and I change their diapers. Sometimes I'll feed them urine out of a baby bottle. It's just fun. I get a power charge. It's just like this euphoric sense of feeling alive and I am in this fantasy and I am playing and I am pretending and it's real at the same time. It's really happening and I like that.
When I am in the dominant role and dominating somebody I am just amplifying certain aspects of my personality.

You get to feel vulnerable and safe and have this experience where you are exposed and you are exploring inside yourself. That's scary. You learn about yourself. It's a catharsis. It's a release, you push them so hard that they just let go, it's very invigorating, they leave and they feel they've had a good cry or they've had a good...
It's sort of a relief from being adult. We have so many fucking responsibilities and you have to pay your bills and you have to be on top of it and you have to hold up this facade all day at work and maybe for some of them they have really high stressed jobs and they go home and they have to be... You are asking me to do this and I am doing it and most people won't do that for you. People are too embarrassed to do that usually because that's not normal human relations you know. Usually by the time they get to me they are ready.

Blindfolds can be very intense because we are so visual and they can hear things and suddenly they are really paying attention. There is definitely a lot I like to do with showing them a lot and then showing them nothing. Some people freak out if you blindfold them.

I don't have full control, of course. Sometimes I do, it depends how much they give me.

Humiliation is one area that I very much enjoy that does get risky. It does happen sometimes that people get broken and then I have to be really careful and be a responsible dominant and I have to take care of them at that point. For me personally I feel that I need to be almost more aware of their needs than they are. Which is a big responsibility and sometimes they don't communicate with me or they don't say their safeword or they let me push them further than they really should be pushed. A safeword is a codeword they can say that means: I really need you to stop. It's like a word that doesn't have anything to do with the scene rather than saying no because "no" is sometimes part of the fun of the scene. It's important to me to play safely. I'm not interested in injuring somebody.

Confronting fear is always heroic. I think that for some people their fears are so difficult for them that when they confront them it's too scary for them. They are missing adrenaline, you know, it's like if you never travel anywhere else you're missing experience. Maybe they are just gonna live afraid their whole lives and I guess that is a little bit sad to me. I think it's important to, not necessarily do it all at once, but to me life is about growing and you don't grow if you don't look at what you're afraid of.

I don't have any full-time slaves now but I have had slaves in the past. I still do, I have house-boys. Houseboys are a level below a slave, they just clean and maybe you play with them a little bit or you do something with them that is kind of special for them. There's different types of slaves: there's some slaves that want to be totally owned they want to be in possession and they just want to have all the responsibilities taken away and they want to do everything for you. They want to serve you and they want to belong to you and be your little pet. Then there's other slaves that just want to be a maid they want to dress up in a maid's costume and clean and be like a woman even if they might be a man, then there's women that want to be men. There's all different types.

I enjoy feeling that somebody wants to be dependent on me in a contextualized state, but to be dependent on me in their life, completely, that is to much responsibility for me and I'm not interested.

For me, SM means a consensual agreed upon exchange of power. If they don't do everything I say, what am I going to do? They give me power. That means they have power over me because they have given me their power. So, in other words the submissives gets what they want so they are kind of in control really. All my submissives are equal partners in reality. I'm telling them what to do, they scrub my toilet, they clean the floor but they get my attention, they get my time, they get to be with me, they get to give up responsibility, that is their gift. They get to let go and be told what to do and have an experience. For some people they don't get to do that any time in their life.

I will only see them if I think that they are genuinely curious. I would probably get a feel for what type of person you are just by talking to you on the phone. If you laugh a little bit if you are comfortable with yourself. You know, a lot of guys call and they just want to talk or some-times they are masturbating when they call. You can tell by the kind of questions they ask, like: what are you wearing? That is an immediate tip off. There are certain things I don't do, I don't do sex and if somebody wants to kiss my body a lot, I'll tell them I won't see them because I don't enjoy that. Maybe a little bit is okay and if they get in and I'm enjoying myself I might let them kiss my body but it's only if I want to at that time. There is certain things I do not allow ever, I do not allow my breasts to be touched or I don't do anything involving shit.

When you are a mistress you have to be psychic a little bit, you have to be really intuitive, you have to be able to read people. It's like somebody that has a really nice touch whereas some-body who is never going to have a nice touch. Some people, when they touch you, they are sensitive. You can also learn some techniques like obviously if somebody is breathing heavily and their body is rioting they are probably having a good time whereas if they are shuttering and they are pulling away they are not having a good time. It's pretty obvious once you have learned the signs.

Perverted is a term that is... it's so vague to me. It's basically like an adjective to me. Nothing is definitely perverted to me. Somebody might have fantasies about eating dogshit, well it's not what I'm into but I actually like to talk to people about doing things like that, so whatever, I must get off on it too, so does that make me a pervert? I guess so.

I had no idea I was headed this way. In my artwork I would do these performances, where I would be doing all kinds of things that I do with my clients all the time. With performance art it always felt like... we are probably the least respected of artists. Everytime I'd show in a gallery I would be fighting with people to do my piece the way I wanted to. I wasn't doing anything dangerous, it was just all this resistance. When my clients come they want me. They want to give me money, they want me to pay all my attention to them. I feel like I get a lot back. Money is also about power and space is also about power and it's all very tied in together. Although it's nice to say that the starving artists has the most integrity, I think that's a bunch of bullshit.

The sex industry is the only industry where women make more money than men. When I did performance I felt like I was giving people something that maybe they didn't want. Which is okay, I think that's the job of art. The job of art is to give people sometimes something that they don't want, a thought that makes them uncomfortable. I get to make people uncomfortable but they want it.

3 Telephone calls
The telephone rings at Mistress Josephine

- Hello, yes, what is your name? Greg, have I spoken to you before? Where did you hear about me? New Reality, what is that? ...and what sort of play are you into? Oh, degradation, so you like heavy kind of psychological play? Ok. Do you have any limits as far as degradation goes? Do you like any kind of pain Frank? What kind? What are your pain limits like? Medium, ok. Do you like verbal humiliation also, to be abused verbally? And again do you have any limits in that area? ...That sounds good, bye-bye.

The telephone rings

- Hello, what is your name? Dan, and where did you hear about me? Where are you calling from? So you have a female submissive that you want to be trained. What is your arrangement with her? What’s her name? Is Lisa available to speak to? I will need to speak to Lisa at some point just to confirm that she is into this. I need to make sure that both parties are willingly involved. What sort of thing were you looking for exactly? Well, I have a lot to offer, I’m very flexible, very versatile, but I don’t understand exactly, you haven’t told me, what is your interest in having her trained by a professional mistress? ...well, I don’t do sex in my sessions, I get a lot of pleasure out of other activities...well, we will get into more details once I have spoken to her. All right Dan, nice talking to you, bye-bye.

(Mistress Josephine puts down the telephone)

Flake another flake, well maybe, hard to say, possibly not serious.
Why? ( the interviewer)
Because, usually when it’s a couple situation and the guy is calling you can almost guarantee that he is full of shit. He is like imagining: Oh I have this slave to do anything. It’s possible though, I mean, I would love if it were, I love playing with girls.
And he also wanted a full weekend? (the interviewer)
Yeah, I don’t ever even get into that until I’ve seen somebody, I’ve been burned too many times.

The telephone rings

- ...I don’t want to spend the whole time on sensual play. If we do a scene where I’m telling you what to do and ordering you around, verbally dominating you and playing with you then that’s definitely appealing. Does that sound ...? Ok, good... to sort of convince you to submit, right, and do you like to be sort of be made fun of for being weak around women? Do you like physically strong women? ...not necessary...ok. I was just wondering because you said you liked to have your hair pulled and stuff like that, I was wondering if you wanted to be sort of, not pushed around in a heavy way, but just kind of directed in a very physical way? ...Ok, I think I have a pretty good idea of what you are coming from. So, I will give you specific directions when you confirm your appointment. So, I will talk to you at three o’clock good, bye-bye.