Like A Phoenix

Christian Bass, born in 1978, is far more than just a writer. He is a lyricist, poet, musician, photographer and journalist; above all, he is someone who has never been content with having just one voice. His creative journey spans literature, poetry, photography, film and music, bringing together his personal experiences with his restless urge to tell stories, express ideas and turn feelings into words, images and sounds.

He was born in Hamburg but grew up in Schleswig-Holstein. From an early age, his home region became an important part of his personal and creative identity. Yet he was equally drawn to the wider world. His journey took him through the Netherlands, Spain, Scotland and Mauritius before repeatedly bringing him back to his northern German roots. The different places, cultures and chapters of his life left their mark, traces of which can still be seen and felt throughout his creative work.

Christian Bass began writing his own stories and poems at the age of ten. For him, writing was never simply a pastime; it was first and foremost a way of making sense of the world, processing what he experienced, asking questions and giving a voice to those who had none. Those early childhood stories gradually developed into a passion that has stayed with him ever since, continually taking on new forms along the way.

His creativity, however, has never been limited to the written word. Since 1986, he has been writing and composing his own songs. Music became another important way of expressing his personality. Through rhythm and melody, he found a second artistic language, allowing him to explore themes and emotions that could not always be expressed through literature alone. Today, he writes and composes for international artists and works as an executive producer, helping them move their projects towards success without losing sight of his own creative path. His own projects include the Stoneheart Project, as well as the punk-rock band The DEAD Sharks, which he co-founded in the early 1990s.

In 1998, Christian Bass self-published his first short story, Jimmy’s Got A Gun, achieving his first local success. Several major publishers had previously rejected the story, citing the youth protection regulations in force at the time. Rather than seeing those rejections as the end of the road, he chose to follow his own path instead – an attitude that has continued to shape his artistic journey ever since.

Just a year later, he achieved another breakthrough when his poem Schleswig-Holstein was published in an anthology by Realis Verlag. That first success showed him that persistence could pay off. Two years later, he repeated that success with his poem Die deutsche Rotbunte (The German Red-Colored).

The years that followed became an especially difficult period for Christian Bass. The continued rejection of his stories by established publishers led him to enrol in several distance-learning courses on writing. Instead of giving him greater confidence, however, the pressure continued to build and eventually developed into a prolonged writer’s block. At the same time, turbulence in his private life and the repeated refusal to rely on his famous family name placed additional strain on him.

To make ends meet financially, he wrote pornographic material for various sex magazines in Germany, Austria and Switzerland during this period. In doing so, he built up his first readership, proving to himself that his writing could reach people. Although these pieces were written primarily to earn a living, they became an important part of his biography and another chapter in his development as a writer.

His long-term relationship with an English singer became an important source of support during this difficult period. While professional setbacks and his ongoing writer’s block repeatedly planted seeds of doubt, being with her gave him renewed confidence and strength. Together, they wrote numerous songs for her, and despite his struggles with writing, he found a way back to his creativity through music.

Their time together in Glasgow became one of the happiest periods of his life: a time when he felt accepted both as a person and as an artist, and when, for a while, he could leave the doubts and disappointments of the previous years behind. Yet even this happy chapter was eventually overshadowed by a personal tragedy that left deep scars and ultimately brought the relationship to an end.

After a detour via Hamburg, fate eventually took him to Mauritius in 2009, where a new chapter of his life began. Together with his new partner, he founded cbvisions photography, specialising in book covers, illustrations and book trailers for German publishers and authors. At the same time, he established himself as a photographer and journalist, writing in both German and English for local websites and businesses.

In 2011, he published his first book, the lyrical autobiography This is me, a monkey in the music. At the same time, a reading of This is me reached number one in the radio charts in several Asian and African countries. Towards the end of the year, he also succeeded in having the children’s story Leonas Geheimnis (Leonas' Secret) and the short story Eltern haften für ihre Kinder (Parents Are Responsible for Their Children) included in a publisher’s anthology, marking the beginning of a new and particularly productive phase of his creative work.

From then on, numerous publications followed under various pseudonyms as well as under his real name. His work appeared through publishers in Germany and the United States, alongside further self-published works. Many of his stories and collections of poetry and lyrics found an international audience and reached Top 10 positions in their respective genres.

In spring 2015, his journey brought him back to Germany, where he gradually became less visible in the public eye. He found a new home in the heart of the Ruhr region, where he remained until 2023, before eventually returning to northern Germany. Throughout these years, his creative work continued to expand and evolve.

Since 2020, numerous examples of his photography have been featured in international exhibitions and published in respected magazines. Alongside literature, photography and music have become central parts of his creative output. His work frequently moves between reality and fiction, personal experience and social observation, dark stories and lighter moments.

In summer 2026, Christian Bass brought his long-standing work under the cbvisions photography name to an end in order to devote more time and energy to new creative projects.

For him, art is not a closed space with fixed boundaries. It emerges wherever experience meets imagination, memories become stories and thoughts take shape, whether through words, images or melodies. At the heart of it all is his constant attempt to create something that reaches his audience and continues to resonate long after the moment itself has passed.

Today, Christian Bass is no longer simply active as an author, lyricist, musician, photographer and journalist. He is an artist firmly rooted in real life, drawing on everything around him. With the Stoneheart Project, he continues his musical work, whose roots stretch back to the mid-1980s. Alongside this, he continues to develop new literary and visual projects.

His journey has never been a straight one. It has been shaped by rejection, envy and new beginnings, by personal losses, professional upheavals and the repeated decision to carry on. The child who once wrote melodies and stories has become an artist who, to this day, refuses to be confined to a single form of expression.

And that is the constant running through his work.

Christian Bass has repeatedly found new ways to keep telling his stories, regardless of whether he had words, images or music at his disposal. He turned experiences into stories, memories into art and an often difficult journey through life into something new time and again. His biography is therefore more than the story of a writer. It is the story of a man who, like a phoenix rising from the ashes, has spent decades continually rediscovering and rebuilding his artistic voice.

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