Inga Ābele is considered one of the most important Latvian writers of her generation. Her unique writing style, which brings out the richness of the Latvian language, is characterized by strong imagery and intense atmosphere. Inga Ābele manages to completely harmonize the personalities of the protagonists with the environment, be it a Latvian household, a landscape or an era in history, while literarily leading the reader by the hand through the hard-hitting reality as if it were a fairy-tale forest.

Ida Lødemel Tvedt, born in 1987, previously taught essay writing in Norway and the US, at the New School and Columbia University. Her work has appeared in Guernica, N+1., Vagant, Vinduet, and Daz Magazine, among others. Currently she's writing reports for the norwegian newspaper Dag og Tid. Marianegropen (Gyldendal, Oslo 2019) is her debut.

Claudia Schneider (born 1963) embarked on a world tour at the age of 22. She then became a freelance writer and photographer for German-language media, including Merian, NZZ, Tages-Anzeiger, and Cosmopolitan, and published some 15 travel guides with Bild-Atlas, Marco Polo and Regenbogen-Verlag. Since 2004, she has been the editor of a local newspaper in her home canton of Zug. In What We Should Know About Consciousness, she follows up on her fascination with consciousness and embarks on an inward journey . . .

Demian Cornu was born in Bern in 1981, earned degrees in religious studies and history, and worked for nine years in asylum processing at the State Secretariat for Migration. ‘Transits of Small Worlds’ is his literary debut.

Annelie Kebschull (born 1999) grew up in a spa town in northern Germany and now lives in Lüneburg. Driven by a vision of how effective structures could make life easier, she studied communication design. During her studies she discovered a fascination with psychology and dedicated herself to the question of how personality can be visualised. She is now working toward a degree in cultural studies, still looking for ways to make the most meaningful contribution possible to building a better world.

Shubhangi Swarup is an author, journalist, and educator. Breadths of Desire, her first novel, is an international bestseller and has been translated into 15 languages. It won the Sushila Devi Award and the Tata Literature Live! Award for debut novels and was shortlisted for the JCB Prize for Indian Literature. Shubhangi Swarup has been awarded the Charles Pick Scholarship for Creative Writing at the University of East Anglia. She lives in Goa, where she looks out over a rapidly changing seascape from her desk.

Maria Zimmermann was born in Zurich in 1991. She studied Arts and Design Education at the Zurich University of the Arts. She self-published her thesis, 299 Dresses, and her work ‘#fridgelove’ was exhibited at the Gewerbemuseum in Winterthur. Since 2018, she has worked as a textile artist, producing works of embroidery under the label ‘Alles wird gut‘ (Everything’s going to be alright). Her larger works adorn album covers, jackets, and walls.

Géraud Guillet is an innovation expert who holds a degree in international management. He is the author of À la fin de ce livre vous ne fumerez plus: L’Expérience TESK (Hachette Pratique). Shaped by his own extreme experiences, Géraud Guillet has created books promoting innovative, optimistic, and effective ways of thinking that open up new prospects for a better life.

Tibor Joanelly is an architect, publicist and teacher. He received his degree in architecture at the ETH Zurich and worked in numerous well-known Swiss architectural offices. Next to his practice, he led atelier discourses with Swiss architects such as Christian Kerez, Valerio Olgiati and Livio Vacchini. He published essays and articles in various architectural magazines. Tibor Joanelly was teaching at the Budapest University of Technology, at ETH Zurich and at the University Liechtenstein. He currently lectures on Architectural Critique at the University for Applied Sciences in Winterthur ZHAW and he is an editor of the Swiss architectural magazine werk, bauen + wohnen.

Thomas Pfenninger (b. 1984) grew up in Zurich and now lives in Bern. Alongside his work as a freelance author and copywriter, he is press spokesman and communications officer for a number of companies in Zurich, Berlin and Bern. In 2017, he self-published Fragments, a volume of poetry addressing the relationship between truth and perception. In 2018, he finished work on a novel, The Spoon Monologues, which has not yet been published. Now, Later, Tomorrow is his debut novel.

Seraina Kobler is a journalist and author. After graduating, she worked as an editor for various daily and weekly newspapers. In the domestic section of the "Neue Zürcher Zeitung" she was responsible for social issues before setting up her own writing studio in Zurich's old town. She is the mother of four children. Rain Shadow is her first novel. Her literary work has been supported by various foundations, as well as the Federal Office of Culture.

Jörg Rehmann was born in Merseburg (Sachsen-Anhalt) in 1966 and grew up in East Germany. His work has been published in magazines and anthologies. He studied nursing management and now works as a lecturer and lives in Berlin.

Stephan Schmitz is an award-winning illustrator based in Zurich, Switzerland. He studied illustration at the Lucerne School of Art and Design. Stephan loves to surprise his viewers. In a single picture he can tell an entire story by using.
His work has been recognised by the Society of Illustrators in New York, American Illustration, Applied Arts magazine and 3x3 the Magazine of Contemporary Illustration. In 2015 Creative Quarterly named him one of their Top 25 illustrators. Lürzers Archive named him one of the world’s 200 best illustrators of 2016/2017.

Maarja Kangro was born in Tallinn in 1973. She is one of the most compelling Estonian authors and poets of the 21st century. Her work, which has won numerous literary awards and tributes from her readers, gives expression to a complex and distinctive perception of life. It ranges from cynical social comedy, political reportage and intellectual game-playing to expressions of deep empathy with physical suffering and bodily fragility. Kangro began her literary career as a translator (of, among others, Leopardi, Zanzotto, Agamben and Enzensberger) and as a writer of libretti for contemporary classical composers. Her poems and short stories have been translated into more than 20 languages.

Nadine Olonetzky was born in Zurich in 1962. She studied at the Schools of Design in Basel and Zurich. After on-the-job training on the editorial staff of the cultural magazine du she worked as an adjunct at Kunsthalle Wien and at the Fotomuseum Winterthur. She was responsible for visual arts projects at the Kulturstiftung des Kantons Thurgau for several years and was editor of the arts supplement of the literary magazine entwürfe.
Olonetzky is an author and editor and writes on topics having to do with photography, art and cultural history for publications including NZZ am Sonntag. She is a member of “kontrast”, and, since 2008, project leader and copy editor at Scheidegger & Spiess.

Dag Olav Hessen earned a candidatus realium degree in zoology in 1982, a Master’s in public law in 1984, and a doctorate in biology in 1988. In 1993 he was appointed professor of biology at the University of Oslo. He has been a member of the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters since 1998. Hessen is the leader of the “Centre for Biogeochemistry in the Anthropocene” at the University of Oslo.
In his publications Hessen addresses themes such as ecology, evolution, and food systems, connecting them other disciplines such as ethics and philosophy. He has published several books on popular science and has been awarded, among other prizes, the Fritt Ord Honorary Award, the Riksmål Society Literature Prize, the Akademikerprisen and the Humanistprisen.

Juha Hurma was born in the town of Paimio in Finland. He earned a degree in biology. Since the 1990s he has written and staged plays and published several novels. Hurme is considered one of the most innovative directors and playwriters in Finland. In 2006 he won the Eino-Leino prize for his staging of classics, in 2014 the Jarkko-Laine prize for his novel Nyljetyt ajatukset (Skinned Thoughts) as well as the most important theatre prize in Finland, the Eino-Kalima prize. In 2017 he was awarded the Finlandia prize for his novel Niemi (The Peninsula).

Nicholas Lobo Brennan studied at the University of the Arts London, the Royal College of Art, and London Metropolitan University. Together with Tom Emerson, he teaches design, construction and history courses at the ETH in Zürich. In 2010 he founded the GRUPPE architecture practice with Christoph Junk and Boris Gusic. GRUPPE won the Swiss Art Award for Architecture in 2012.

Sasha Cisar studied at the ETH Zürich, Tokyo University of Arts and the University of Liechtenstein. He is the founder of THEORIST, a platform for critical discourse on architecture and urbanism. For six years he served as editor of the journal published by the architecture department at the ETH Zürich. Currently he researches and teaches sustainability, economics, and the crisis in architecture with Arno Schlüter at the ETH.

Jeremy Stangroom lives and works in Toronto, Canada. In addition to his work as an author he teaches sociology and psychology. In 1997 he founded The Philosophers’ Magazine. He is the author of Einstein’s Riddle (Bloomsbury) and The Story of Philosophy (Quercus), likewise a joint effort with James Garvey.

James Garvey is an American philosopher. He earned his doctorate at University College, London. He lives in England and works at the Royal Institute of Philosophy. He is the editor of The Philosophers’ Magazine and a series of books called Think Now. He regularly writes for the Guardian about climate change and morality.

Julian Sartorius, was born in Thun, received private drum instruction from Fabian Kuratli and Michael Wertmüller and studied at the Hochschule der Künste in Bern and at the Musikhochschule in Luzern. He has worked together with nationally and internationally known artists such as Pierre Favre, Hans Koch, Sophie Hunger, Big Zis, Matthew Herbert and Rhys Chatham. He has received numerous prizes and awards for his achievements.

Annette Beger was born in Zürich in 1972. She studied acting at the Berliner Schule für Bühnenkunst, completed a classical voice training in Essen, and earned a diploma in arts management at the Zürcher Hochschule für angewandte Wissenschaften. In October 2010 she founded the Kommode Press.

Susi Wirth was born in Chur in 1970. She grew up in Liechtenstein and Switzerland, and now lives and works in Germany. After completing her training as an actor she performed on a variety of stages and has worked together with many independent theatre groups. In 2000 she and the composer and musician Olivier Gabus founded the Companie Sous-sol. Susie Wirth has written numerous plays. The Companie Sous-sol has received many awards.

Ilmar Taska grew up in Estonia and studied at the Moscow Film Institute. He works internationally as a producer, director and screenwriter. He made his debut in the literary world with the autobiographical novella Better Than Life. His short story Pobeda, out of which the novel Pobeda 1946 grew, was awarded the Estonian Literature Prize in 2014. Ilmar Taska is a unique phenomenon in Estonian literature. His works have received international accolades and have already been translated into several languages.

Lu Bonauer, born in Basel in 1973, writes prose and poetry. His works have appeared in a number of anthologies and have won awards in various competitions. He was the winner of the OpenNet writing competition at the Solothurner Literaturtage and wrote the Text of the Month selected by the Literaturhaus Zurich in March, 2002. In 2008 and 2016 he received sponsorship awards from the Panel of Experts in Literature of Basel-Stadt and Basel-Landschaft for the novel-writing projects Heartbeat behind Rock and OLI’s God. In spring, 2019, Lu Bonauer was awarded a grant from the cultural foundation Pro Helvetia.

Ashley Curtis was born in California in 1959. He studied Chinese and biblical literature at Yale and physics and physics pedagogy at Smith College. He taught for many years at the Ecole d’Humanité in Hasliberg, Switzerland, where he served as co-director from 2009 to 2014. He is the author of Error and Loss: A License to Enchantment (2017), The Soul in the Stone - Why the Worldview That Will Save Our Planet Is More Credible Than the One That Is Destroying It (2023) and the mystery novel Hexeneinmaleins (2019), all of them published by the Kommode Press, and the cultural history “O Switzerland!” (Bergli). He lives just outside the Val Grande National Park in northern Italy.

Patric Sandri was born in Uster in 1979. In 2007 he received his degree in illustration from the HGK FHZ in Luzern, and in 2012 his master’s from the Royal College of Art in London. Since then he has created illustrations for newspapers, magazines, books and posters both nationally and internationally. Lately he has been honing his collage techniques. His approach is conceptual and he likes to surprise the viewer with unconventional solutions.

Isabelle Capron moved twenty years ago from Paris to Zurich. She studied philosophy at the Sorbonne University. Today she teaches French at the ZHAW and is a member of the authors collective Index.

Marianne Smolska is a French artist and designer who is originally from Paris but now lives in Hanoi. She works in the field of illustration, graphic design and as well as international NGOs.

Rudy Simone is the author of six books. She founded and developed Help for Aspergers and the International Aspergirl Society®, for which she serves as president. Simone is also a composer, musician, producer and sound engineer, actor and comedian. She has released three albums and regularly gives live performances. American by birth, Simone has lived in various countries. Some of the most significant print publications, including the New York Times, the Sunday Times (of London), the Daily Mail, AERA (Japan) and Time magazine, have interviewed Simone or reported on her work.

Jan W. Faul born in Port Chester, NY in 1945. He has been a photo-journalist, commercial pho- tographer, and artist in the US and Europe for 40 years. His advertising photography has won dozens of awards from Art Directors’ Clubs and professional competitions.

Séamas Ó Maolchataigh wurde 1884 im Süden der Grafschaft Tipperary geboren. Sein Vater arbeitete als Wildhüter für einen lokalen Gutsherrn; seine Mutter, Margaret Burke, stammte aus der gleichen Gegend. Ó Maolchataigh unterrichtete während vierundvierzig Jahren als Grundschullehrer. Zeit seines Lebens hatte er ein grosses Interesse an Folklore und Ortsnamen, und er galt als Experte für den irischen Dialekt der Region. Doch die Publikation seiner Arbeit erwies sich als schwierig. Mit der Veröffentlichung seines Hauptwerkes "An Glenn agus a Raibh Ann" (dies der irische Originaltitel) war er nicht zufrieden, als es 1963 stark bearbeitet endlich erschien.

Martin Avi Abraham was born in Vienna in 1968, and has studied German, comparative literature and architecture. After completing his studies in group dynamics he began a successful career as a management consultant. In 2001 he felt the call to travel. His journeys took him, via Granada and Tuscany, to Switzerland, where he settled and now lives. His literary work is also about traveling or, more accurately, about being on one’s way and seeking.

John Bendall-Brunello grew up outside of Cambridge and currently lives in Cannes. After taking his degree in illustration and design at the Cambridge School of Art he worked for various educational presses until in 1985 he published his first children’s book. Since then over 60 of his picture books have been published in England and the USA, some of them created in collaboration with the most renowned English children’s book authors.

Marguerite Lobeck-Kürsteiner was born in St. Gallen in 1893 and studied Recitation in Munich. A case of tuberculosis led her to take a cure in Arosa, where she first became aware of Rudolf Steiner. She shared her interest in Steiner’s teachings with her future husband, the painter Fritz Lobeck. In 1923 she began her studies at the Eurythmics School in Stuttgart. When she returned to Zürich she took over the eurythmics program at the Rudolf Steiner School there, which had recently been founded by Kurt Englert.

Katharina Cranz was born in 1961 in Frankfurt am Main. She studied art pedagogy, art history and Latin American studies at the J.W. Goethe University in Frankfurt. Between 1985 and 1999 she lived and worked with her family in England. She currently works as a freelance lithographer and illustrator in Frankfurt and teaches illustration, etching, drawing and visual communication at the Gutenberg school.

Annette Lory was born in 1968 in the Bernese Oberland. She lived in various linguistic regions of Switzerland, and later for extended periods of time in the USA and Latin America. Currently she makes her home in Zürich, where she works as a social worker and writer. She writes both for adults and for children and teenagers. Several of her short stories have received awards and been published in anthologies and literary journals. Her radio play Butterflies was nominated for the Bernese sonOhr Festival prize in the Fiction category in 1915. She is a member of Autorinnen und Autoren Schweiz (Swiss Authors) and the authors and artists collective “index”.

Claudia Fellmer was born in 1978. She lives and works in Zürich. After completing technical schooling as a printer she studied at the Kunsthochschule für Medien in Cologne and received her degree in photography from the Hochschule für Gestaltung und Kunst in Zürich.

Sabine Hagmann was born in Basel in 1965, and has lived in Zürich since 1989—interrupted by stays in Genoa, London, Bamako, Marseille and Istanbul. She studied photography and art in Zürich and London.

Lena Grossmüller was born in 1988 in Dorsten. She is a freelance copywriter, concept developer and designer. She studied fashion journalism and media communications at the Akademie Mode & Design AMD in Düsseldorf. In June, 2015, she completed her master’s degree in design at the Zürcher Hochschule der Künste ZHdK.

Corina Capri is a passionate graphic designer, artist, and art therapist. She lives in Zürich and does freelance work on a variety of projects such as publications, commissions, design workshops and exhibitions.

Peter Wyss was born in 1943 in Zürich. He studied scientific drawing with Karl Schmid at the Kunstgewerbeschule Zürich. After two years working in pharmaceutical advertising at Geigy in Basel he moved to Paris. There he enjoyed a successful career as a freelance illustrator for various international magazines and advertisement agencies. His calligraphic creations were in demand and drew clients such as Credit Suisse, Beyer, and Blondino. From 1969 to 1971 he worked as a preliminary course teacher at the Ecole National des Arts Decoratives and as co-illustrator of the 20-volume Livre de la Santé.

Manuel Gamma was born in 1972 in Zürich. He studied philosophy, journalism, psychology and German literature. After breaking off his studies he worked as a social education worker in various homes for teenagers with behavioural difficulties. From 2002 to 2005 he was a video trainer for Szenario, an institution for unemployed teenagers. He then worked as an editor and producer for the program Glanz & Gloria on Swiss Radio and Television.

Dr. Samantha Todd is a clinical psychologist who specialises in learning difficulties and autism. She works with children and teenagers, leads workshops for teachers and caregivers, and has developed an intervention program directed at parents of children with handicaps and autism (Riding the Rapids: Living with Autism and Disability©).

Timothy Archibald lives in San Francisco. His photographs have appeared in leading photography magazines and been exhibited at, among other institutions, the Australian Center for Photography, the Zephyr Mannheim Gallery, and Videotage in Hong Kong. His portraits of his autistic son appeared in 2010 in the prizewinning volume Echolia / Sometimes I wonder published by Echo Press in San Francisco. Photographs from this volume were also printed in Das Magazin Nr. 48, dedicated to the theme Deaf, Gifted, Murderers. When Children are so Different from Their Parents.

Robin Schenkel was born in Zürich in 1996, graduated from the Rämibühl Gymnasium in Zürich, and currently studies machine construction at the ETH. He made use of his extended Matura essay to fulfil his childhood dream of writing his own book.

Tibor Pataky was born in 1970 in Cologne, studied architecture in Aachen and Venice, and worked in a number of Swiss architectural firms and as an academic assistant in the architecture department at the ETH Zürich. During a sabbatical in Berlin in 2006 he wrote the short novel Alex. Since 2009 he has dedicated himself more and more to his writing.

Emil Bürer was born in 1972 and grew up in Sarganserland, where he still lives and works. His life’s rhythm is determined by his family, his profession as a teacher, and his activities in nature and in the mountains.

Martin Bichsel was born in 1973. He is a freelance photographer who works primarily on editing. When not working on commissioned projects, he devotes his time to his own artistic works such as the long-term project Trans*Visit, Fremd-Kontakt (2016) and portraits of refugees in Bern. He is a member of the cross-disciplinary collective rueckenlage – music and visuals, which has generated the productions Reisefluss (2009), fLiegen (2010) and Haiku (2012). He learned his trade as a photographer through an autodidactic program at GaF. He has studied with, among others, Reto Camenisch, Heini Stucki and Jürg Ramseier.