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Gregor Kulla: it’s not political, it’s simply trending

(2026)

The title of the work is a phrase used by the influencer and well-known ‘looksmaxxer’ Clavicular when asked why he had visited Israel. In reality, his visit was an Israeli propaganda campaign, codenamed the ‘Esther Project’ . According to documents filed under the US’s Foreign Agents Registration Act (Fara), Israel paid influencers up to $7,000 per social media post. The aim of the propaganda campaign linked to Clavicular was securing favourable content for Israel as the Gaza genocide shreds its international standing, and to rehabilite the reputation of an online influencer accused of antisemitism.

Social media is still something that is not taken too seriously. Campaigns by Estonian politicians are still in their infancy on social media. In the US, social media is largely under the influence of the right wing and filled with their propaganda. The world’s largest social media platforms are owned by the world’s richest men, whose sole aim is to maximise profits. At the same time, people are spending more and more time on social media, which is why it is a perfect breeding ground for propaganda campaigns and other forms of manipulation, as it is currently almost impossible to distinguish truth from falsehood. Many also associate social media with a sour taste, particularly when it comes to young people’s mental health.

»it’s not political, it’s simply trending« utilises material sourced from social media, LGBT+ slang and African American Vernacular English (AAVE), which gen-Z skilfully employs (words like ‘period’ , ‘slay’ , etc.), to draw attention to the seemingly absurd, yet often highly political and power-related processes taking place on social media. The aim is also to offer an alternative interpretation of social media content. After all, this is the so-called digital public sphere; why not reflect to what happens there accordingly?

(Gregor Kulla)

Gregor Kulla
© privat

Gregor Kulla is an Estonian composer, performance artist, writer, and critic. They majored in composition at the Estonian Academy of Music and Theater (with Helena Tulve and Tõnu Kõrvits, cum laude), and in oboe and composition at the Heino Eller Music School (with Anna Šulitšenko and Katrin Aller, with honours). They studied sustainable art creation at the European School of Participation 2021 in Novi Sad, Serbia, and from 2025, they are studying at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Vienna (mdw).

Nowadays Kulla is particularly interested in social media, technopolitics, but also gender studies, minority and queer cultures, Indian philosophies, and Buddhism. Often their music is seen and heard as something seemingly unchanging, which preserves itself only through constant change. They have written for solo instruments, ensembles, orchestras, film, performances, and other stage works. Kulla’s piano quintet brook (2023) has been described by a British critic, Simon Cummings, as follows:

»Nothing was still: little taps, trills and tremolos, with occasional plunks that in this rarified context sounded almost like great boulders falling from the sky, in the process begging the question of how fragile this world actually was. […] At no point did Kulla break the spell, from start to end we are immersed in pure magic.«

In 2024, Kulla released a vinyl soundtrack for Kris Lemsalu & Johanna Ulfsak’s art mockumentary Old Piano (MIDA Records). They have served as creative producer and assistant artistic director for the international contemporary music festival AFEKT since 2021 and host the radio show (new) music w/kulla on IDA Radio.

Kulla received the honorary title of city Tartu (Tartu Noor Kultuurikandja) in 2020 and, in 2021, became a laureate of Estonian main cultural newspaper Sirp. They are a recipient of the annual prize of the literary magazine Värske Rõhk, the Esimese Sammu literary award, Erkki‑Sven Tüür Foundation scholarship and in 2024 they received one of Estonia’s main literary prizes, the Betti Alver literary prize with their debut book Peenar (2024, Värske Raamat), which is described as a book that pushes boundaries.

Estonian choreographer, dancer, and poet Sveta Grigorjeva wrote the following about Peenar: »This is a distinctive, dodecaphonic‑like text corpus, written in a stream‑of‑consciousness style yet lightly curated—retaining its juicy richness while maintaining internal logic and coherence.«

In 2025 they received third place with a solo piano piece wait, i’m forgetting something in the International Rostrum of Composers in the category of composers under 30 years of age. They have published over 100 articles.

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Gregor Kulla: it’s not political, it’s simply trending

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