Christian Lerch (born 1978) is a

journalist A journalist is an individual that collects/gathers information in form of text, audio, or pictures, processes them into a news-worthy form, and disseminates it to the public. The act or process mainly done by the journalist is called journalism ...

and

radio documentary A radio documentary is a spoken word radio format devoted to non-fiction narrative. It is broadcast on radio as well as distributed through media such as tape, CD, and podcast. A radio documentary, or feature, covers a topic in depth from one or ...

producer based in

Vienna, Austria en, Viennese , iso_code = AT-9 , registration_plate = W , postal_code_type = Postal code , postal_code = , timezone = CET , utc_offset = +1 , timezone_DST ...

and

Berlin, Germany Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constituent ...

Early life and education

Lerch graduated from the

University of Vienna The University of Vienna (german: Universität Wien) is a public research university located in Vienna, Austria. It was founded by Duke Rudolph IV in 1365 and is the oldest university in the German-speaking world. With its long and rich histor ...

, He studied at the

Erasmus University Erasmus University Rotterdam (abbreviated as ''EUR'', nl, Erasmus Universiteit Rotterdam ) is a public research university located in Rotterdam, Netherlands. The university is named after Desiderius Erasmus Roterodamus, a 15th-century humanist ...

Rotterdam Rotterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Rotte'') is the second largest city and municipality in the Netherlands. It is in the province of South Holland, part of the North Sea mouth of the Rhine–Meuse–Scheldt delta, via the ''"N ...

Netherlands ) , anthem = ( en, "William of Nassau") , image_map = , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = Kingdom of the Netherlands , established_title = Before independence , established_date = Spanish Netherl ...

Career

Lerch worked at the

Leo Baeck Institute The Leo Baeck Institute, established in 1955, is an international research institute with centres in New York City, London, and Jerusalem that are devoted to the study of the history and culture of German-speaking Jewry. Baeck was its first intern ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

. In 2006 he began working as a

radio Radio is the technology of signaling and communicating using radio waves. Radio waves are electromagnetic waves of frequency between 30 hertz (Hz) and 300 gigahertz (GHz). They are generated by an electronic device called a transmit ...

producer, author and director for

radio art Radio art is an aural art form made with sound. Artists use radio technology (i.e. radio transmission, airwaves) to communicate artistic compositions for interpretation – exposing their audience to alternate means to experiencing their art thro ...

documentaries A documentary film or documentary is a non-fictional motion-picture intended to "document reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction, education or maintaining a historical record". Bill Nichols has characterized the documentary in term ...

for the Austrian Broadcasting Corporation

ORF ORF or Orf may refer to: * Norfolk International Airport, IATA airport code ORF * Observer Research Foundation, an Indian research institute * One Race Films, a film production company founded by Vin Diesel * Open reading frame, a portion of the ...

, the cultural channel Radio Österreich 1 and the German public broadcasting network WDR focusing on political and (pop-)culture topics. In 2009 he produced the

"Sold/Verkauft!" about four Uighur men who had been sold as suspected terrorists to the

CIA The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA ), known informally as the Agency and historically as the Company, is a civilian intelligence agency, foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States, officially tasked with gat ...

and imprisoned for four years at the prison camp

Guantánamo Bay Guantánamo Bay ( es, Bahía de Guantánamo) is a bay in Guantánamo Province at the southeastern end of Cuba. It is the largest harbor on the south side of the island and it is surrounded by steep hills which create an enclave that is cut off ...

. The radio documentary was published as an audio book in 2011. Lerch created a three part series of radio programs on illegal drugs: "Crystal Meth. A homemade drug" (produced by the

2007), "Apocalypse Goa" (a co-production of WDR/

2010) and "Viva La Muerte. The drug ballads of northern Mexico" (produced by the WDR/

2012) are documentaries commissioned for broadcast in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. Lerch is the co-founder of "name>it positive media" and co-editor of the 2010 FIFA World Cup web journal kaptransmissions.org. Lerch occasionally writes and publishes for newspapers, including

Der Standard ''Der Standard'' is an Austrian daily newspaper published in Vienna. History and profile ''Der Standard'' was founded by Oscar Bronner as a financial newspaper and published its first edition on 19 October 1988. German media company Axel Springe ...

Wiener Zeitung ''Wiener Zeitung'' is an Austrian newspaper. It is one of the oldest, still published newspapers in the world. It is the official publication used by the Government of the Republic of Austria for legally-required announcements, such as company r ...

and the Russian weekly magazine ''Ogoniok''. In 2014 Lerch is a fellow at the European Journalism Fellowships at the Freie Universität

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...

, researching surveillance and control of public urban spaces in Germany and in the United States. In collaboration with the German theater directo
Matthias Kapohl
Lerch produced in 2015 the first binaural radio feature. Through this recording and production technology the

"Bi-Normal" enables the listeners to a 3D

audio Audio most commonly refers to sound, as it is transmitted in signal form. It may also refer to: Sound *Audio signal, an electrical representation of sound *Audio frequency, a frequency in the audio spectrum *Digital audio, representation of sound ...

experience, that is usually used for

radio drama Radio drama (or audio drama, audio play, radio play, radio theatre, or audio theatre) is a dramatized, purely acoustic performance. With no visual component, radio drama depends on dialogue, music and sound effects to help the listener imagine ...

and in sounds for

movies A film also called a movie, motion picture, moving picture, picture, photoplay or (slang) flick is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, feelings, beauty, or atmosphere ...

. With the

multimedia Multimedia is a form of communication that uses a combination of different content forms such as text, audio, images, animations, or video into a single interactive presentation, in contrast to tradition ...

documentary
illegaledrogentöten
(''eng. illegal drugs kill'') Lerch finalized 2016 the

trilogy A trilogy is a set of three works of art that are connected and can be seen either as a single work or as three individual works. They are commonly found in literature, film, and video games, and are less common in other art forms. Three-part wor ...

on the devastating effects of the global

war on drugs The war on drugs is a Globalization, global campaign, led by the United States federal government, of prohibition of drugs, drug prohibition, military aid, and military intervention, with the aim of reducing the illegal drug trade in the Unite ...

in consumer markets, transit and producing countries of illegal drugs. It was the first

live Live may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Films * ''Live!'' (2007 film), 2007 American film * ''Live'' (2014 film), a 2014 Japanese film *'' ''Live'' (Apocalyptica DVD) Music *Live (band), American alternative rock band * List of albums ...

social media Social media are interactive media technologies that facilitate the creation and sharing of information, ideas, interests, and other forms of expression through virtual communities and networks. While challenges to the definition of ''social medi ...

, using

comments as a

narrative A narrative, story, or tale is any account of a series of related events or experiences, whether nonfictional (memoir, biography, news report, documentary, travel literature, travelogue, etc.) or fictional (fairy tale, fable, legend, thriller (ge ...

. For

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

’s prestigious art museum

Kunsthistorisches Museum Vienna The Kunsthistorisches Museum ( "Museum of Art History", often referred to as the "Museum of Fine Arts") is an art museum in Vienna, Austria. Housed in its festive palatial building on the Vienna Ring Road, it is crowned with an octagonal do ...

, Lerch developed and curated 2019 the multimedia project “six seasons” consisting of an audio podcast and

animated Animation is a method by which still figures are manipulated to appear as moving images. In traditional animation, images are drawn or painted by hand on transparent celluloid sheets to be photographed and exhibited on film. Today, most anim ...

videos. Six paintings of the renowned

old masters In art history, "Old Master" (or "old master")Old Masters De ...

collection of the museum were used by a selection of contemporary writers (a.o.

Ann Cotten Ann Cotten (born 1982 in Ames, Iowa) is an American-born Austrian writer. Life and work At the age of five, Cotten moved to Vienna with her parents, who are both biochemists who worked in Vienna. She finished university there in 2006 with a work ...

, Mark von Schlegell, Hanno Millesi) to write fictional short stories, that were transformed into a series of audio dramas. Through fictional

storytelling Storytelling is the social and cultural activity of sharing stories, sometimes with improvisation, theatrics or embellishment. Every culture has its own stories or narratives, which are shared as a means of entertainment, education, cultural pre ...

“six seasons” provides a contemporary perception of

Renaissance The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history marking the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and covering the 15th and 16th centuries, characterized by an effort to revive and surpass ideas ...

and

Baroque The Baroque (, ; ) is a style of architecture, music, dance, painting, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished in Europe from the early 17th century until the 1750s. In the territories of the Spanish and Portuguese empires including t ...

paintings, conveying historical artistic intention into new and varied media formats.

Awards

Lerch received various awards, including the Award for ORF Journalists, and the Hans Nerth- Radio Scholarship. In the years 2010 and 2011 Christian Lerch was nominated for the CNN Journalist Award and for the Austrian Journalism Prize, the Dr. Karl Renner Prize In the year 2010 he received the second prize of the FEATUREPREIS Award in

Basel , french: link=no, Bâlois(e), it, Basilese , neighboring_municipalities= Allschwil (BL), Hégenheim (FR-68), Binningen (BL), Birsfelden (BL), Bottmingen (BL), Huningue (FR-68), Münchenstein (BL), Muttenz (BL), Reinach (BL), Riehen (BS ...

Switzerland ). Swiss law does not designate a ''capital'' as such, but the federal parliament and government are installed in Bern, while other federal institutions, such as the federal courts, are in other cities (Bellinzona, Lausanne, Luzern, Neuchâtel ...

. For the documentar
#illegaledrogentöten
(English title: #illegaldrugskill) the third and final part of the trilogy on the effects of illegal drugs and of the war on drugs Lerch was awarded a Silver Award for the best radio programs 2017 at th
New York Festivals
. With the program "Papa we're in Syria" Lerch followed a father searching and trying to rescue his sons, who had joined the so-called

Islamic State An Islamic state is a State (polity), state that has a form of government based on sharia, Islamic law (sharia). As a term, it has been used to describe various historical Polity, polities and theories of governance in the Islamic world. As a t ...

ISIS Isis (; ''Ēse''; ; Meroitic: ''Wos'' 'a''or ''Wusa''; Phoenician: 𐤀𐤎, romanized: ʾs) was a major goddess in ancient Egyptian religion whose worship spread throughout the Greco-Roman world. Isis was first mentioned in the Old Kingd ...

Syria Syria ( ar, سُورِيَا or سُورِيَة, translit=Sūriyā), officially the Syrian Arab Republic ( ar, الجمهورية العربية السورية, al-Jumhūrīyah al-ʻArabīyah as-Sūrīyah), is a Western Asian country loc ...

2015. That program won him the prestigious European Media Award

Prix Europa {{notability, Events, date=March 2021 PRIX EUROPA – The European Broadcasting Festival – is the Europe's largest annual tri-medial festival and competition. The event takes place in the third week of October in Berlin, Germany. PRIX E ...

for the Best European Radio Documentary 2017. The jury of the

BBC Audio Drama Award The BBC Audio Drama Awards is an awards ceremony created by BBC Radio to recognise excellence in the radio industry, in particular in audio dramas. The inaugural awards were presented in 2012 and the ceremony hosted at the BBC Radio Theatre, Bro ...

selected the podcast
six seasons"
as a finalist fo
Best European Drama
2021.

References

External links

FEATURE: "Protokoll eines Totschlags" by Christian Lerch
for the ARD Radio Festival 2013
name it positive mediaWebjournal kaptransmissions.org
for the FIFA World Championship 2010 in South Africa
Article on the CNN Journalist Award Nomination of Christian Lerch
in the Austrian newspaper

Kurier ''Kurier'' is a German-language daily newspaper based in Vienna, Austria. History and profile ''Kurier'' was founded as ''Wiener Kurier'' by the United States Forces in Austria (USFA) in 1945, during the Allied occupation after World War II. ...

Article on the CNN Award Nomination of Christian Lerch in the media journal ExtradienstFEATUREPREIS - International documentary award

Early life and education

Career

Awards

References

External links

See also