Who is Poppy? Cyberqueen or comic figure? Performance artist or influencer it-girl? Human or robot? Many questions, to which there are even more, but no clear answers.
When Poppy takes to the stage, organizers may find themselves nervously checking Google Image Search to see if this is really the right artist performing - or just another woman pretending to be Poppy. Because Poppy is always surprising people with new looks. And it is precisely these that have become her trademark.
Long gone are the days when Poppy allowed herself to be pigeonholed as a cyberqueen and "internet personality" inspired by manga and Japanese pop. Yet it was less than five years ago that feature writers were praising her and her videos as "commentaries on society that touch on the anxieties of modern life" - and naming her in the same breath as mystery director David Lynch, film fabulist Tim Burton and even pop god Andy Warhol.
She is now fully human again, albeit not the nice girl next door - Poppy wants to be idolized. She sees herself as a religious leader and you can join her Church of Poppy on the Internet. For the time being. Because Poppy is actually planning to launch her own Internet. The global data network as we know it has made her famous - and as she says herself: "The internet was my teacher." She used it for years
, sometimes to conduct interviews with potted plants on YouTube or to distribute ambient music she had composed herself. She worked with a technique called Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response, which generates crystal-clear sounds directly from brain waves - and sought advice from sleep researchers.
Science, art or satire? We don't know. And Poppy perhaps doesn't care. She raises questions for which there are no answers. This is also the case in her new video "I Disagree", where she pours petrol over record bosses and sets them on fire - a rejection of the music industry? In the song "Concrete", Poppy fantasizes about being cast in concrete, then shovels in a latex suit in the cemetery and sings sweetly about ice cream and tea. The music moves between rocky heavy metal riffs and cheerful, upbeat country melodies. Poppy changes genres and styles faster than you can zap a remote control.
If it weren't all so complexly combined and full of clever allusions, it could be elegantly dismissed as the attitudes of an attention-hungry Instagram chick. However, the disruptive artist presents the squaring of pop provocation that makes Lady Gaga look old and Madonna ancient - even the currently universally praised Billie Eilish looks like a bland emo buzzkill next to her.
In the meantime, even the Rolling Stones are said to have outed themselves as Poppy disciples, and shock rocker Marilyn Manson even invited the pop Greta, who turns all clichés on their head, to his fiftieth birthday party. The Swiss Poppy community is looking forward to the upcoming concert in Zurich's Plaza - the charismatic artist is sure to win over new fans in the city of Zwingli.