Christian Michelides

Christian Michelides, 2005

Christian Michelides (* July 19, 1957 in Graz) is an Austrian psychotherapist. He is the director of Lighthouse Wien.

Life and Career

In 1973 Christian Michelides started to work as an opera critic of a provincial newspaper called Südost Tagespost. He achieved his highschool diploma in 1978. Thereafter he studied philosophy and history of theatre in Vienna, while still publishing articles in Austrian and Italian newspapers and magazines.

In the 1980s Michelides was a collaborator for the new founded magazine WIENER, then joined the ad agency GGK Wien and the marketing team of the Swiss watch Swatch in Biel. At the same time he organized a series of exhibitions in Vienna and published some catalogues. 1983 he organized an art fair for photography in the Wiener Stadthalle. Together with Jorit Aust he founded Studio Molotov, a gallery for art photography.

In the early 1990s he served as a journalist for the magazine FORVM and other publications in Austria and Germany. Michelides wrote about the membership of Thomas Bernhard in a conservative party organization called the Bauernbund,^[1] Rudolf Augstein publishing in the Nazi paper Völkischer Beobachter, and finally disclosed Gertrud Fussenegger, Austria's most prominent female author, as a former avid Hitler worshipper.^[2] Michelides also discovered that the Austrian Academy of Sciences had secretly stopped awarding the Grillparzer Award, a prize for dramatists in the name of Austrian national poet Franz Grillparzer,^[3] and he researched and documented the expansionistic endeavours of großdeutsch oriented Alfred Toepfer and his close ties to Joseph Goebbels^[4]

Starting in 1994 Michelides changed his focus to human rights activism and the defence of minorities. In June of 1995 he founded the first International Human Rights Tribunal in Vienna. ^[5][6] Michelides served as an attorney general. The theme of the tribunal was the discrimination and persecution of lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgender-persons in Austria during the period from 1945 to 1995.

Michelides was the founder of the initiative Häfn human, that counselled and visited prison inmates,^[7] he fought against discrimination of people with HIV und AIDS and participated in grassroot organisations like Club Plus,^[8] Selfhelp Vienna and Social Work from underneath. From 1995 to 1997 Michelides chaired the Austrian Lesbian and Gay Forum (ÖLSF) and was one of the driving forces behind Austria's first CSD parade, called Regenbogenparade.^[9] In 1998 he started his social work for the homeless.

In 2000 Michelides founded Lighthouse Wien, a shelter for homeless drug addicts with severe traumas, many of them HIV-positive. In 2002 he was graduated as a Sex and Mental Health Counselor, in 2010 he completed his education as a group analyst and a psychotherapist.

Publications

• (ed.) Wiener Blut '83: Eine Gesellschaftskomödie mit Paten und Kindern. Published by Michelides. Vienna 1983.
• (ed.) Marcus Leatherdale. With texts by Kathy Acker and Christian Michelides. Published by Studio Molotov, Vienna 1983.
• (ed.) Fotografie '83. Austria's first photography art fair. Published by Michelides, Vienna 1983.
• (ed.) Lothar Rübelt: Das Geheimnis des Moments. [The Secret of the Moment], exhibition at Albertina, published by Michelides Vienna 1985
• (ed.) Memorandum über die Stiftungen des Alfred C. Toepfer und deren Zusammenarbeit mit der Universität Wien. Vienna 1991, 3rd edition

References

1. ^ Thomas Bernhard und die ÖVP, Wien 1990.
2. ^ Friedrich Denk: Die Zensur der Nachgeborenen. Weilheim i.OB 1996 (3. Aufl.), S. 13–138, 164–188.
3. ^ Sylvia Vogler, Christian Michelides (ed.): Der Skandal um den Grillparzer-Preis. Pressedokumentation, Wien 1990.
4. ^ Michael Pinto-Duschinsky: Der Kampf um Geschichte. Der Fall Alfred C. Toepfer und der Nationalsozialismus. In: Michael Fahlbusch, Ingo Haar (ed.): Völkische Wissenschaften und Politikberatung im 20. Jahrhundert. Paderborn 2010.
5. ^ Wiener Zeitung, June 10, 1995: Österreich auf der Anklagebank. [Austria in the Dock]
6. ^ Gerhard Oberschlick: Appell des 'Internationalen Menschenrechts-Tribunals' gegen die Diskriminierung von Homosexuellen und Transsexuellen in den Medien. In: Database on legal information relevant to the audiovisual sector in Europe IRIS Merlin. The Audiovisual Law Information Wizard 1995-7:12/36 [1]
7. ^ "Florian Klenk. Drei Leichen im Keller. Falter Juni 2001". Falter.at. 2001-06-13. http://www.falter.at/print/F2001_24_1.php. Retrieved 2011-10-03. 
8. ^ "CLUB PLUS Selbsthilfeverein auf der Seite der Wiener Ärztekammer". Ew.aekwien.at. http://wwwnew.aekwien.at/1836.html. Retrieved 2011-10-03. 
9. ^ "LN 3|05.indd" (PDF). http://www.lambdanachrichten.at/ln305.pdf. Retrieved 2011-10-03.  [Rainbow Parade]

External links

• Christian Michelides in the German National Library catalogue (German)
• Publications in the Austrian National Library
• Publications in FORVM

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