Alena Gerber is a German model

Model (person)

A model , sometimes called a mannequin, is a person who is employed to display, advertise and promote commercial products or to serve as a subject of works of art....

, actress and TV host.

Life

Gerber was born in Baden-Württemberg

Baden-Württemberg

Baden-Württemberg is one of the 16 states of Germany. Baden-Württemberg is in the southwestern part of the country to the east of the Upper Rhine, and is the third largest in both area and population of Germany's sixteen states, with an area of and 10.7 million inhabitants...

 and was discovered by a German model agency at the age of 13. She participated in regional beauty contest

Beauty contest

A beauty pageant or beauty contest, is a competition that mainly focuses on the physical beauty of its contestants, although such contests often incorporate personality, talent, and answers to judges' questions as judged criteria...

s. She also had brief guest appearances on several German TV series and has appeared in a number of German TV shows.

Gerber resides in Switzerland

Switzerland

Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....

, Germany

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

 and the USA. Her agency is Vivienne models.

TV hosting and acting

After numerous appearances on German IPTV

IPTV

Internet Protocol television is a system through which television services are delivered using the Internet protocol suite over a packet-switched network such as the Internet, instead of being delivered through traditional terrestrial, satellite signal, and cable television formats.IPTV services...

 channels she started hosting the Zurich Nightlife show usgang.tv (usgang means "to celebrate" in Swiss German).

In 2010 Gerber was the face of the Streetparade, the Swiss version of the German Loveparade.

German guestworker controversy

Alena Gerber became particularly famous in Switzerland when she was at the center of a xenophobic controversy between the conservative Swiss People's Party

Swiss People's Party

The Swiss People's Party , also known as the Democratic Union of the Centre , is a conservative political party in Switzerland. Chaired by Toni Brunner, but spearheaded by Christoph Blocher, the party is the largest party in the Federal Assembly, with 58 members of the National Council and 6 of...

 (Schweizerische Volksparty) and German guest workers. The Swiss People's Party's stance was the too many German foreigners would already overcrowd Switzerland, destroy its cultural identity and take away the citizen's jobs.
The German and Swiss yellow press newspapers BILD and Blick

Blick

Blick is a German-language daily tabloid newspaper published in Zürich, Switzerland since 1959 by Ringier.It has a circulation of 275,000 and a readership of 750,000 . Only the free daily 20 Minuten has a higher circulation in Switzerland....

kept the issue in the media for several months, thereby indirectly contributing to Gerber's increasing popularity. The argument ended, when People's Party officials and Alena Gerber reconciled in public in late 2009.

Swiss television named Alena Gerber "one of the most prominent examples of Anti-German sentiment".

External links

• Official website
• Official Sedcard at Vivienne Modelmanagement