Portraits of Women, Program 3

Rist’s first name is a conflation of her given name, Charlotte, and that of Pippi Longstocking, a feisty children’s book character who has been a longtime inspiration for the artist. Pepperminta, Rist’s reinterpretation of the fictional heroine, lives in a fantasy world that is a mix between children’s tales and the Flower Power scene of the 1960s and 1970s: colors are the young woman’s best friends, strawberries are her pets, and she knows amazing remedies to free people of their fears. As with Rist’s video installations, the colors are saturated, the action is filmed with unusual angles, scale is distorted, and music is integral to the narrative.