Last year, the pink bows took over. Themes of girlhood dominated pop culture in 2023 as Barbie broke box office records, kicking off a season of hot-pink everything. Designers took the coquette aesthetic—think dainty and feminine styles like puff sleeves, pastel colours and lace—to the runway. Beyoncé and Taylor Swift glittered up stadiums and overwhelmed the Ticketmaster website with their world tours. Think pieces declared 2023 “the Year of the Girl,” a celebration of all things feminine.

The paintings of Jeanine Brito, who grew up in Canada and is currently based in Belgium, feature the same wrinkly ribbons and gowns that have filled many women’s Pinterest boards and TikTok feeds during this latest hyperfeminine wave. But unlike pop culture’s shiny image of girlhood, which casts it as a paradisiacal period of naivety and freedom, Brito’s art is almost nightmarish. She lays bare the horrors of ...