About judit

Judit Wild has two lives. A professional one: she's a sociologist, specialized in media research. The other one is a crafter’s: making jewelry and photography. Visit Vadjutka to find out more about her double life!

October 29, 2010

don’t sit under the olive tree with anyone else but me

Have you heard about the ancient olive trees in Puglia, southern Italy? Frances J. Melhop from Matchstickgirl, a fantastic photo artist – who was featured here, on Scoutie Girl a while ago – has: she has been dreaming to capture them on film for a decade.

Now her dream has a chance to come true: she is in Puglia with her olive trees, shooting them in the oldest photographic way: you know the head under the darkcloth type of shooting.

I am a real boy – photo by Frances J. Melhop

To be able to complete her dream and project she needs funding, and she will get help from Kickstarter which helps launch creative projects, if Frances can collect 4000 US dollars by 3rd November. By now Frances has collected more than half of the money, but Kickstarter projects must get full funding or they are cancelled.

Frances has 5 days left: if you would like to help her dream come true, please back her project here, on her project’s Kickstarter page: every iota, penny or cent counts.

Thanks in advance for the magic of the feeling how strong a community can be!

Filed Under: photography Tagged With: , 6 Comments
September 26, 2010

with love from europe: greece

ceramic and silver earrings by lilarubyking

Greece gave so much to me: besides democracy, the country gave me 7Up, Sprite, a pen pal, handsome boys, squids and Ermoupolis.

What do you have in mind if I say “Greece“? Blue ocean, white houses, feta cheese? My mind connects Greece with “Western” rarities, like Sprite and 7Up, and of course boys looking like ancient Greek gods. (I have no idea how did the Greek gods look like, but when I saw these guys at the age of 12….) I was in Greece for the first time in 1987: two years before the Iron Curtain fell down. This aspect is quite important: we, teenagers in Hungary were extremly fond of “Western” foods and objects. That is why my main memory of that journey is that I drank 7Up and Sprite in the camp we stayed for all two weeks along. (Well, probably I spent all my money on these, haha.) You can guess one was my favourite!

acrylic colored bird earrings

I have another “first” experience from Greece: it was there, where I tasted a squid. We were on the beautiful island of Rhodes, motorbiking up and down, and we arrived to a tiny restaurant close to one end of the island: we had to stop there, because the wind was so strong there, that it practically blew away the motorbike. So there were we, at the end of Rhodes, and something was hanging down from a tree: it looked like drying clothes, but it wasn’t. I went closer and then I saw: they were those animals with many arms, that I always feared. OK, I thought I will eat a Greek salad, if they do not have anything else. Well, they didn’t have: not even Greek salad, it was a restaurant specialized to squids. This way we ordered a plain roasted squid – and it turned out to be delicious. Since then I am a fan of roasted squids.


Drying squid by Bram Meijer

The last time I have been to Greece, we were sailing on the Aegean Sea, visiting islands in the Cyclades. It was an amazing journey, just as you would imagine it in a film: white boat and shirts, delicious food, azure ocean – and yes, we saw dolphins as well. One of the islands we visited was Syros, that has three municipalities, which is a lot in case of these little islands. The biggest of them – with a population of 13,000 – is Ermoupolis, which happens to be the capital of the Cyclades.

blue bird earring hoops by tothemetal

Apart from being a lovely city with white houses, restaurants and many-many cats, it has one more thing that differentiates it from all other similarly lovely islands. Ermoupolis has an Opera house! It is amazing isn’t it? The citizens of Ermoupolis were not satisfied with a simple Opera house, they wanted to have something special. I can imagine them: thinking very hardly – almost like Winnie the Pooh – about how to make a special Opera house. And they got an idea: let’s make an Opera house just like the famous Opera in Milano, Italy, the Scala! So let it be: they built it, but of course Ermoupolis is much smaller than Milano, so they had to built the Opera house much smaller. And there we are: Ermoupolis has a mini-Scala. Unfortunately my photos are on film, and I could not find a photo on flickr, so you have to try to imagine it based on the real Scala!

Syros Cats by Patrick JCH

{ earrings featured from top to bottom by lilarubyking, lacravatteduchien, and ToTheMetal }

Filed Under: jewelry, with love from europe Tagged With: , 10 Comments
August 24, 2010

Fall in Europe

Though it is still hot and sunny outside, Europe – and I guess the whole hemisphere – is preparing for fall. European indie designers have collected their brand new products into one post over their blog, Handmade Europe, here are some of them as a teaser.

As Europe being a multicultural place, there is not one single trend one can follow regarding European designs. For example those living in colder countries like Latvia or Norway, offer a wide variety of felted clothes and accessories. From the central part of Western Europe, like Switzerland and Belgium, simple designs come with a little, often very feminine twist. However, one thing maybe common: colors. Soft colors like pale purple and blue, ivory and beige can be found in most of the designs. Which means from a practical point of view that wherever your browser may take you in Europe, one can find a variety of products in matching colors.

karuski

faima

fleurfatale

vadjutka

iragranteco

See more colorful, warm, happy and fluffy designs from European etsy sellers on Handmade Europe!

Filed Under: $25-50, $50-100, accessories, handmade solutions, jewelry Tagged With: , , 6 Comments
July 30, 2010

With love from Europe: Germany

Let me start this journey with a confession: because of my roots I had prejudices towards Germany. For a long time I did not even want to visit that country where my family was tortured. After a while I gave in, and visited Berlin, its capital in 2003 for the first time. A whole new world began.

Though we spent there 4 days, I only remember one thing from my journey to Berlin in 2003: it is the Jewish Museum. The building itself is a piece of art, and it also tells a story with the help of light and shadow, narrow and broad corridors and other details I might haven’t noticed. The buliding, which is the work of a genius, architect Daniel Liebeskind, tells the story of torture and freedom in a subtle way, that the visitor only can feel it, not “know” it.

The exhibition is also impressive: one can dive into the history of German Jews from the beginnings, but it was the building that caught my imagination, and does not let me go since then. I felt respect coming from the building: respect towards Jews and history (which is a very difficult and painful question for a lot of German people, as far as I know).

Jewish Museum Berlin
The Jewish Museum by likemike

During that 4 days we visited Checkpoint Charlie as well – which is a museum now about those people who tried to flee to Western Germany from Eastern Germany during the Cold War – but I did not get the point, did not feel what it could have meant, though I really tried to. Not until 2008, when I visited Berlin again. I was walking along the Eastside Gallery -  which is a small part of the Berlin Wall, that remained more or less in one piece – I was watching at the graffiti and reading the messages visitors left: it was a beautiful sunny and peaceful day. Later that day somehow I found myself at Potsdamer Platz, the centre of Berlin, where the original Wall was.

Looking at the small parts of the wall the city left there for memento, I started to feel anxiety and despair, and started to understand what could have happened to the thousands of families, that were torn apart when the Berlin Wall was
erected during one summer night in 1961.

Eastside Gallery: Beauty will save the world!
Eastside Gallery: Beauty will save the world by vadjutka

Don’t worry, there are lots and lots of other places in Berlin, that do not have this heavy historical meaning like the above mentioned ones. For example there is the most popular area, named Friedrichshain with lots of galleries, design shops and cafes. If you happen to have a walk there, dont forget to visit Szimpla which is a lovely Hungarian cafe in that area. Also, if you want to have a fun evening go to the cult bar, Kaffee Burger which hosts the famous Russian Disco every second month. I just don’t have words how funny it is to party for Russian (and sometimes Hungarian) music and shout it out loud: Disco in Moscow!

PS.: I have to admit that the 95% of the time I spent in Germany was in Berlin, which is only a small part of Germany. Next time I will visit other parts as well, I promise!

images: collage by stephanie levy, scarf by avaoriginal, cuff by latouchables

Filed Under: fiber, illustration | painting, with love from europe Tagged With: , , , , , 5 Comments
July 2, 2010

With Love from Europe: UK


painted wooden houses by iris o’connor

I have spent quite some time in the UK, namely in London. So far I have been there four times, and that is why I  know: that is the place where everything is possible.

Most of the time I spent in the UK was in London – though I made some excursions to famous places like Cambridge – that is why most of my memories are from “London-country” as my mother used to refer to London. In this post I will recall a few of my favourite memories from this exceptional place.

resin ring by quercus silver

No doubt, I like to go out to clubs that are different from the usual “dancing-drinking” scenes. The most amazing club I have ever been to is in London: it was called Shunt and it was situated in a tube station. It is quite a unique idea to put a club in the tube station itself, but the club had more to give. Every week they had a new exhibition, so they could support a lot of emerging artists, as well as experimental theatre shows and of course dance halls. We dived into this cultural club, and spent like 7 hours there. And what is the best that can happen after a party-night? Chilling out in the parks of Greenwich, watching squirrels and clouds.


Shunt: club in the tube station photo by vadjutka

I visited the UK in 1994 for the first time: I attended a language school there. One day I found something very interesting in the tourist guide book of a Japanese friend: I found the route to THE forest. THE forest is the 100 Acre Wood (also known as Ashdown Forest), and until then I did not know that it existed in reality. Quickly we decided to go there in the weekend, and I was very delighted when I spotted the tree in which Piglet – my favourite character – is living. (But he was not at home.) I became even more excited when we arrived to the Poohsticks Bridge: imagine grown-up Sweedish tourists playing the game: throwing sticks into the water and yelling loudly: “Go stick, go!”.


Pooh on Pooh Bridge, photo by ankehuber

My best cinema experience was also in London. I saw my first black and white silent film there, near to the Hammersmith metro station: actually two in a row, because they sold student tickets for the movies only 4 pounds. I did not know what to expect, so I was extremely surprised when a piano player came in and started to play. He played all along the two movies, and I felt myself in the 30s. After the last pictures the piano stopped the audience stood up and celebrated the piano player for minutes: it was really touching. I never experienced such respect and enthusiasm before. Probably it was just a kind of usual Friday for a lot of people there, but for me it was a magic moment that I still remember, though it was 14 years ago.

Filed Under: with love from europe Tagged With: , , , 9 Comments