Maribel Königer is Director of Communications, Journalism, and Media at ERSTE Foundation in Vienna and is responsible for programmes for facilitating investigative journalism and free media in Central, Eastern and South Eastern Europe. Since September 2023 she has held the position of representative of ERSTE Foundation on the Supervisory Board of PLURALIS. After graduating in Arts and History in Munich, she went on to work as an art critic and journalist in Paris. Between 1992 and 1996, she reported on French cultural life for German media outlets like German daily newspapers Süddeutsche Zeitung, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, German magazines Focus, Vogue and different art magazines. In 1996, she changed sides and got involved in public relations. Among other things, she was spokeswoman for documenta X (1997) in Kassel and Head of Communications for the Culture and Science Programme of EXPO 2000 in Hannover. In 2007, she transferred to ERSTE Foundation. The core shareholder of Erste Group invests part of the dividends into strengthening the civil society of Central and Eastern Europe. Since 2007, ERSTE Foundation has been making investments to provide further training for investigative journalists in Eastern Europe. In 2019, ERSTE Foundation and BIRN founded the cross-border journalism platform “Reporting Democracy”. ERSTE Foundation is member of the founder platform Civitates, where it promotes “Public Interest Journalism” in Europe. ERSTE Foundation has been invested in PLURALIS, a mixed fund for media diversity in Europe, since 2023. And the foundation has been a supporter of Journalismusfest Innsbruck since its very beginning.