Advisory Board
Dr. Andreas Altorfer
Dr. phil., psychologist, managing director and museum director of the Psychiatry Museum Berne, Stab Med. Dienst, Arbeitsgruppenleiter Forschung
Cornelia Christen
Member of the Executive Board, Head of Residential Home, Solodaris Foundation, Olten
Sylvia Frei
lic. jur. Attorney
Helen Hirsch
M.A. art historian, director and curator, Kunstmuseum Thun
Dr. Monika Jagfeld
Dr. phil., Director Kunstmuseum Lagerhaus St. Gallen, Curator Outsider Art, Art Brut, Naive Art, Board Member of the European Outsider Art Association (EOA)
Dr. Olaf Knellessen
Dr. phil., Head of Psychoanalysis Seminar Missing Link, Zurich, Supervisor
Dr. Alfred Künzler
Dr. phil., psychotherapist, trainer, teaching therapist and supervisor, Head of the Swiss Mental Health Network Coordination Office, FOPH
Markus Landert
lic. phil., art historian, director of Kartause Ittingen
Prof. Dr. Katrin Luchsinger
Dr. phil. Art historian, research area art and psychology/psychiatry, initiator of Atelier Inklusiv, professor at the Zurich University of the Arts
Prof. Stefan Ribler
Lecturer in Social Work, OST- Ostschweizer Fachhochschule St. Gallen, initiator of the cultural cycle Kontrast für Kunstschaffende mit einer Beeinträchtigung, FH St. Gallen, head of the Betula Institute, Romanshorn,
Prof. Dr. Erich Seifritz
Psychiatrist, Member of the Board of Directors of the St. Gallen Psychiatric Association, Wyss Private Clinic for Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, Münchenbuchsee, Member of the Board of the Medical Society, SGSPP and SGPP, Head of the Psychiatric University Hospital Zurich (PUK), Professor of Psychiatry at the University Hospital Zurich.
Franca Weibel
Peer worker, founder of Trialog and Antistigma Switzerland
Prof. Dr. Günther Wüsten
Psychotherapist and social pedagogue, hypnotherapist, University of Applied Sciences Olten, CAS artistic and cultural competences in psychosocial practice
Many famous artists of the past, as well as of the present, have suffered mental shocks. Art is the language of the soul, so it is not surprising that these artists in particular manage to touch people with their works. The Living Museum offers people with psychological suffering the possibility to express themselves with their creativity. They experience a community, they have a common place where they can be creative in many different directions. Through the exhibitions that take place time and again, where their art can also be bought, they become aware that they are doing something valuable, that they are part of our society and that they can be proud of themselves and their works. People who regularly go in and out of Living Museums are happier, more balanced and very often manage to overcome crises without hospital stays. This alone should be reason enough to support the Living Museum Switzerland and to promote the expansion of its locations throughout Switzerland. I will continue to do this with my resources very happily.
Art as a form of expression has therapeutic potential - this is how I have experienced it in various roles. And several people benefit from it: the artist, the person enjoying the art and the health service, because it is a cost-efficient form of therapy.
Impressed by the open approach to art on the one hand, to patients on the other, and by the great commitment to overcoming boundaries, limitations and exclusions, I would like not only to get inspired by the activities of the Living Museum, but also to try to contribute to making the great potential of this work better known and, above all, appreciated and taken up.
Psychiatry is a place of borderline experiences between healthy and sick, between normal and not normal. The Living Museum is a place that opens borders. It awakens one's own artistic potential and thus overcomes the boundary between art contemplation and art production. It ties in with Beuys' concept, according to which every person has artistic potential. In this way, the Living Museum also casually overcomes the boundary between healthy and ill, because it addresses the person as an artist as a creator of art. This is liberating and allows the people in the studios to once again take on a productive role with recognition and thus receive what we all desire.
