Proz Com Certified Pro

Late in September I read about a new program on Proz.com, 'the world's largest community of translators' (which, btw, may even be true;-)) that aims at making the top professionals among the many thousands of language service providers offering their services via their site more visible. Or, in their own words:

For years, professional translators who deliver high quality work on a consistent basis have been challenged when it comes to effectively distinguishing themselves -- online and globally -- from those who can only claim to be top professionals. As a result, what we see is that it is not always the top translators who win the client. Moreover, it is not difficult to come to the opinion that the most qualified professionals do not necessarily earn incomes commensurate with their abilities, which are in many cases extraordinary.

Interested as I was in this program I applied and two weeks later, on Oct 9th, 2008, I was accepted as a participant in the ProZ.com Certified PRO network, hence may call myself ProZ.com Certified Pro for my top language pair (English to German) now. That's of course no big deal, yet taking into consideration the quite strict set of standards for inclusion (credentials, recommendations, publications and so on and so forth) I'm more than happy.

Mein Land|Mon pays by Michael Blum

textkultur proudly presents: my first serious French-German translation in book form, Michael Blum's artist's book Mein Land [My Country; original title Mon pays] published by Unrast Verlag, Münster & rotor-association for contemporary art, Graz in March 2008, 92 pp.
ISBN 978-3-89771-478-6

“MEIN LAND is a collection of about one hundred compressed texts about cases of alien’s deportation in Europe. Based on the daily news about the deportation of people without permission to reside, Michael Blum has developed a scaring litany of suffering and lives destroyed in the name of the rule of law and democracy.”
This book was published in the frame of the project "Land of Human Rights".

A Short 'Unofficial Annual Report'

As this year is slowly turning to a close, it is time to look back. It is time for a brief ‘unofficial annual report’, a little summary of what 2007 has brought about for textkultur. To begin with, 2007, textkultur’s fourth year since it was founded, has been a fairly good year — it has been the second quite successful year in a row, with sufficient turnover and the one or other really interesting and promising new regular client.
The fourth year in a row I contributed English-German translations of essays to the bilingual catalogues accompanying the exhibitions of the Kunsthaus Graz — Werner Reiterer. Eye Sucks World and Bubble Peddler. Cerith Wyn Evans, which were opened in February and March, China Welcomes You ... Desires, Struggles, New Identities (opened in June 07) and Volksgarten. Politics of Belonging, the autumn exhibition organized in collaboration with the steirischer herbst festival.
I did a considerable number of translation and proofreading jobs for the Kunsthalle Basel (CH) in the framework of the exhibitions Bas Jan Ader. Fall (April), Poor Thing (June - September) and the three parallel exhibitions Ibon Aranberri. Integration, Minerva Cuevas. Phenomena and Michael Hakimi. ROOF (all opened in Sept 2007).
Moreover, I translated Adam Budak's guest curator contribution for the Kunstmuseum Liechtenstein exhibition Monika Sosnowska. Loop from Feb 16 - May 2, 2007 (ENG-DEU), the 'complete encyclopedia' of Black Market for Useful Knowledge and Non-knowledge No. 8 in the frame of the steirischer herbst festival (ENG-DEU & DEU-ENG) and numerous texts for rotor - association for contemporary art , mainly but not exclusively in the frame of the long-term art-related EU project "Land of Human Rights". I worked for the Springer Group and translated a couple of contributions to the magazine Kunst und Kirche in early summer (ENG-DEU). Since early summer I have translated (DEU-ENG) a considerable number of marketing and press texts for the MuseumsQuartier Wien, Vienna.
Yet, in 2007 I also worked quite extensively outside my specialty fields, arts and culture, - and was given the opportunity to gather quite a lot of translation and proofreading experience in other, less lofty, fields - i.e. predominantly in the fields of advertising and corporate marketing. I translated quite a lot of material for HP (ENG-DEU; hired by their London-based advertising agency) and translated or proofread texts about depilation products, digital game cameras or pharmaceutical products etc. On the whole, the art circus has not been as dominant as in previous years but I'm still heavily relying on it. Nevertheless, my profile has diversified in 2007, and this is good.