1. How did you become an art therapist? What made you decide to take this course?

After my professional career as a classical singer, I wanted to explore the therapeutic effects of music, especially the voice. I completed the music therapy training programme (bam) in Zurich. I then studied psychology at the HAP (University of Applied Psychology, now ZHW). I later completed the MAS in music therapy and the music psychotherapy training programme and also completed an emergency psychology course. 

2. What do you enjoy most about your job?

Music gives me a different approach to people; I usually get in touch with children and young people more quickly. My training has taught me how to listen. Sometimes I make music in the room with the whole family of a child with cancer, experience the joy and the emotions, see the glow in the children’s eyes, the hopeful faces of the parents, small islands, small spaces that music can create to push the existential worries into the background for a moment. I like the fact that I can counter the (difficult) reality through our shared creativity and that I can create lasting, beautiful memories through the shared experience of music. In palliative situations, music is like a bridge, far from any words, in silence – connected with a single sound. It is touching, sad and has a beauty all of its own. 

3. How long have you been active in the Foundation’s projects?

I have been working at the Eastern Switzerland Children’s Hospital since 2009 and have been associated with the Fondation ART-THERAPIE since then.

4. How would you describe your work?

My work is varied, profound, touching, creative, funny, sometimes stressful and demands a lot from me. It requires a great deal of empathy and, at the same time, detachment, both internally and externally. Self-care, flexibility in dealing with families and the team. A love of humanity and curiosity are prerequisites for this and the knowledge that I am embarking on a journey with each new family and that we sometimes don’t know where the path will lead. I have to endure many ambivalences, many uncertainties, feelings of helplessness, anger and sadness, but also a lot of joy, happiness and gratitude. A kaleidoscope of life’s emotions. 

5. Which artist would you like to dine with and why? 

With Konstantin Wecker, who already accompanied and inspired me in my youth with his songs and profound lyrics. I would also like to exchange experiences with Sina and Büne Huber. And to talk about music and lyrics with Stephan Eicher and Martin Suter. I would like to talk to harpist Andreas Vollenweider about our many years of experience and insights in music therapy. Philosophising with Lars Eidinger about the psychology of his characters in theatre and film. I would like to talk to Thomas Ott about his gloomy pictures, about grief and hope. I would like to talk to the writer Ayelet Gundar-Goshen about her fantastic, differentiated novels and about her work as a psychotherapist in Israel (and how she endures human abysses). With Daniel Schreiber on his latest book about times of loss and with Gabriele von Arnim on the consolation of beauty. 

6. What did you want to be when you were little? 

Deep-sea explorer – I’ve become a bit of that, haven’t I?