We’ll meet again in a decade

On this blog, I have sometimes published photos sent to Mouchette as a sort of message of recognition and friendship.

I publish them under the category “fans”

https://about.mouchette.org/category/fans/

Here I’m publishing a message sent to Martine concerning the emotional experience of visiting Mouchette.org.

Because it was sent  to Martine, I won’t publish the email of the author, but I’m still preserving the exchange of messages here because it contains a promise of meeting again in a decade.

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28 June 2026

Dear Martine,

My name is Alexandre, and I am writing to you from Portugal.

I was born in 2006, about ten years after Mouchette first appeared on the internet. A few days ago, I discovered it for the first time on my phone, without reading any explanations beforehand. I simply wandered through it.

I don’t know if this email will ever reach you, but I felt that I had to try.

Mouchette is unlike anything I have ever experienced. I hesitate to even call it a website, because to me it is a work of art in the truest sense. It made me feel curiosity, unease, admiration, empathy, and wonder—sometimes all within the same page.

There were moments where I recognized parts of myself in the thoughts presented, especially around difficult subjects such as suicide. Rather than feeling judged or instructed, I felt invited to stop and think alongside another human being. That invitation meant a great deal to me.

One sentence in particular stayed with me:

“Would I ever be rich enough to own my name?”

That line brought tears to my eyes. It is one of those rare sentences that continues unfolding long after you have read it.

As I explored, I realized something. I wasn’t trying to solve Mouchette anymore. I was trying to understand the imagination that created it. By the end of my journey, I chose not to uncover every hidden corner of the website. I wanted to leave part of it unexplored because I felt that preserving some mystery was a way of respecting the artwork.

I finished my exploration with a smile on my face and tears in my eyes.

Thank you for creating something that could still move someone nearly thirty years later.

Thank you for showing me that the internet can be more than information or entertainment—it can be a place where one human imagination reaches another across time.

Whether or not you ever read this message, I wanted to express my gratitude.

With deep respect,

Alexandre
Portugal

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29 June 2026

From Martine

Thank you Alexander for your insightful words, it really means a lot to me.
Mouchette is certainly a work of art, created as such in a time and era when there were no reference to what art on the internet could be.
And now my task is to preserve it and keep it active the way I created it, and believe me, it’s no small task, but I owe it to my creation.
Words of appreciation give me the courage to continue.
You seem very young to have such an artistic and refined personal sensitivity, you’re only 20 years old, right?
In my own experience of a timeline, that would be a first encounter of what art can do to reach the existential depths of a person, this “crack where the light gets through” as they say.
Life never gets easier along the way but carrying it through in some imaginary company makes it kinder, more gentle, more human maybe.

Meet me again in a decade, if we’re both still around, and we’ll discuss what difference such an encounter makes for you, for me, for Mouchette….

With affectionate thoughts,

Martine

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29 june 2026

Dear Martine,

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3 July 2026

Hi Alexandre,

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3 July 2026

Dear Martine