Exclusive for IRK Magazine, artist Petite Meller shares her philosophical point of view on different subjects that influence her and all of us at the moment in 4 philosophical lessons with and by Petite Meller.
Leotard- Evyatar Myor, Jacket- Florentina Leitner, Shoes-Marni, Rings- Peace of Schmuck, Hat- Adi Karni Vagt.
Petite Meller uses philosophical thoughts and concepts by Freud, Kant, or Lacan and turns them into perfect pop songs with a deeper meaning behind each of them. Her work is influenced by her studies in philosophy and it is a way to process her past childhood traumas which makes her debut Album Lil Empire ultra-fun to listen to and thought-provoking at the same time. Freud would be a fan!
Top- Raul Orozco, Dress-Florentina Leitner
Jacket- Aharon Genish, Shoes- Florentina Leitne
Photography: Ella Uzan, Fashion Editor: Haya Vider
Jacket- Aharon Genish, Top - Raul Orozco, Dress - Florentina Leitner, Leotard - Evyatar Myor & Florentina Leitner, Jacket - Florentina Leitner, Hat - Adi Karni Vagt , Shoes - Florentina Leitner, Marni & Miu Miu
LESSON ONE: THE PRESENT/THE SUBLIME IN THE CRISIS
In this Quarantine time I am sitting in LA, in my apartment in West Hollywood, drinking hot chocolate, playing piano, and thinking existential philosophical thoughts. These times are very interesting for me, the masks, the hygiene, social distancing, the empty spaces, the new US. I’m reading philosophers like Zizek's new book “Panic", but as a philosophy master Ph.D. on Kant, I'm full of new thoughts.
I find a connection between COVID-19 and the "Sublime" term by Immanuel Kant.
I think this is a Sublime epidemic in the Kantian meaning linked to Kant's book “The critic of judgment”. Of course it is tied more to the dynamic sublime and not the mathematical one.
Where is a disaster in nature, that the mind can’t fully grasp, although it tries endlessly to understand in a painful but enjoyable way but breaks apart only to feel his borders, to feel that there is a transcendental existence which is unknown to us, which is so large that it is impossible for the mind to grasp it.
This “free game” Kant says, that the mind plays in itself to try and interoperate the situation, is similar to this sublime epidemic. For Kant, this is a moral lesson for the mind. I think that this is what we all feel right now about our relationship to the world: These empty spaces that we find ourselves in, when we do the step outside of our house, to the empty streets, empty gardens, empty squares, clean beaches, empty neighborhoods. This emptiness connects us back to silence. What Heidegger in his phenomenology "Being and time" describes as "The Aufhebung", Ex-Nihilo, The creation of Something out of nothing. Life is canceled, let's look inside us, go back to us, and be lifted up by nature.
Jacket- Aharon Genish, Rings- Peace of Schmuck
LESSON TWO: THE SOUND AND THE DANCE
First there is the story, the word, the lyric, the script the sound then comes the creation, like god first said then things became exist. Our unconscious holds the logic of our story, our life, sometimes it isn't clear to us and we don't understand the logic, but if we analyze our own language, dance/art/song we can retroactive that logic.
I love conceptual philosophical dancing and how you can make a philosophical standpoint out of a dance, like "The right of Spring" by Nijinsky. During the quarantine, I feel like my body misses ballet again, I used to dance as a child. I went by myself to an old secret garden villa I discovered in LA. I pick flowers and danced by myself, there are cameras everywhere in LA, I know they watching me. By dancing you can become an animal, head in the clouds like a giraffe, stand like a flamingo. I'm sure they have broken hearts too. I love the healing part of dancing, catharsis. It is like a Shakespearean tragedy.
Top- Raul Orozco, Dress-Florentina Leitner, Shoes- Miu Miu
LESSON THREE: THE DESIRE
Desire by Lacan is the missing element, funny enough he call it Object Petite a, something we lost forever and wish to reunite with, a remanent which we long for, but we actually cant.
This is a desire by Lacan, my music is about this desire, this pain that we could only heal maybe by music or dancing or art.
LESSON FOUR: MUSIC
Jaques Lacan's term jouissance fascinates me, how the pleasure derives from pain.
I was finding myself and my music in it.
My song Baby love is a really sad song about someone who can’t understand the true meaning of love and disappears, but I made it a dancy jazzy pop song to uplift the soul which holds this pain, and in this way try to help me and maybe others.
My new album is darker, In this album, I feel like I’m traveling more inside of me, as I said my intuition is very strong and it sent me to deal with darker edgy philosophical ideas like dying, insanity, a hole in my chest, etc, it is an epic space opera album discussing deep questions of existence merging electronic, Vivaldi and Mahler with big ballads that you can cry to and rejoice.
My new song is far too much in the current situation that it’ll be too sad to release it now.
