I've been nominated for the Liebster Award

Thank you very much, Tiny Tang from Life as a Petite for nominating me for the Liebster Award.

I thought if I ever get nominated I would definitly nominate you, but now you were quicker.

I love your blog because you talk about the things you love (fashion, craft and lifestyle) in a very personal and cute way. 

To give you a little introduction - the Liebster Award is an online award which is passed on by bloggers to other bloggers with 200 or less followers. It is a great and simple way for the blogging community to get to know each other a little better. 

The rules for the Liebster Award are:

1. You must link back to the person who nominated you.

2. You must state 11 facts about yourself.

3. You must answer the 11 questions given to you, from your nominator. 

4. You must nominate other bloggers, and set 11 questions for them to answer.

5. You can't nominate the person who nominated you.

6. You must tell the people you've nominated them, so they can take part!

11 quick facts about me;
Although I live now in Newcastle upon Tyne, I'm originally from the North of Germany, from a beautiful town called Lübeck.
I studied Art Therapy and did an apprenticeship to be a bookseller. 
I love reading books and some of my favourite writers are J.S.Foer, John Irving, Haruki Murakami, Nina Blazon and many more.
I love all kind of art, from Street Art to Guerilla Knitting (I have a thing for Anarchy) to Nicolas de Staël and Giogio Morandi.
Since I live in the UK I have discovered my passion for sewing and crafting, and enjoy reading crafting blogs and browsing on Pinterest.


And here are my answers to the questions given by TinyTang. 

What's your favourite colour?
My favourite colour is white. White can be combined with every other colour and still looks great. White is refreshing, it reminds me of fresh laundry or sailing on the open sea on a sunny day.

White is the colour of a blank canvas, a place where my imagination can run wild and I can express myself.

White is like a mystery, like a thick fog, or deep snow. White covers all things and keeps it a secret. It lets you guess what’s behind the layers.

White light contains according to physics, all colours. When you add all coloured lights, the result is white light, that fact always fascinated me.

If you could have one superpower, what would it be and why?
My altruistic wish would be that human kind would come to their senses and would value life & health more than fictional money & fame. I do not understand why innocent children have to suffer from starvation when people on other parts of the planet thinking about building a lift into space.

My selfish wish is to learn a language quicker (like Neo in “The Matrix” just simply downloading the content). It would be awesome to travel to other countries and to speak the native language. Socialising and learning about other cultures would be so much easier. For starters, I would love to speak Italian, Chinese, Spanish and Polish.

Name 3 of your fashion must-haves
NEON pink - Although more of an accessory, otherwise I would look like Barbie - and that’s not desirable. Pink is one of those secret pleasures of being a girly girl.

A good quality handbag – Even if you wear simple clothes, combined with a quality handbag , you look mysteriously awesome. The same principle applies to good shoes.

Confidence in your own style – Don’t just follow trends, make it yours, be individual, mix it and make the world a brighter and more colourful place.

What's your pet peeve(s)?
I’m getting really annoyed with people who skip a queue as if they were a VIP.

What's your most used word(s) or phrase(s)?
I have lots of geeky running jokes with my boyfriend Steve - depending on what movie we are watching.The all time classic is  from 24 and applicable in a lot of situations is...

“We are running out of time! We don’t have choice!”

6. Do you have any hidden talents? 
I have some awesome cabaret moves. My jazz hands are unbeatable.

And I can fall asleep nearly everywhere. Just give me a minute or two.

7. What's your favourite thing about blogging and where did you get your inspiration to start a blog from?
My favourite thing about blogging is that I can share my creative ideas and hopefully inspire and encourage others to get creative.

I’m not quite sure how it exactly started, but after a chat with my friend Irina about online business, as she is currently programming a language learning website, I was inspired to know more about blogging and bought the book "Blog Inc.” by Joy Cho which turned out to be a great source of information.

In the chapter “Why Blog” the author lists several reasons why we should start our own blog although there are literally hundreds of millions of public blogs out there.
A simple answer of hers is - " we have something unique to say too".

That finally encouraged me to start my own blog, and I am very happy since to have a dedicated space to my creativity.   

8. Have you met any celebrities? If so, who was your favourite?  And if not, if you could meet any celebrity, dead or alive, who would it be?
I have never met a celebrity apart from the usual, seeing them in concerts, on at a convention or at a reading.

I would love to meet Simon Pegg. I am a huge fan of “Spaced” and I follow him on Twitter. He is so mischievous and funny! He pranked his colleagues on the set of “Star Trek – Into Darkness” by claiming they needed to use neutron cream against harmful ionic effects. Eventually the whole crew got involved and even the Make-up department created actual jars of cream to pass around and were telling people they have to shake their hands to release the ions from their body. Epic! How lame is the 1^st of April?

9. What’s your guilty pleasure?
I love watching romantic comedies and reading girly teen novels - they make me happy.

10. What's one food you couldn't live without?
Does coffee count as food? If I’m honest, I couldn’t cope very well without coffee. That reminds me, I’ll be back in 2 minutes, just making some ...

11. Take a picture of your favourite item of clothing/accessory.

I love my embroidered red shoes from Dune.

My nominations for the Liebster Award are:
Tierschutz geht uns alle an
Loosing weight and keeping it off

And my 11 questions for the nominees are:

When you have 1 hour of free time, how do you prefer to spend it?
What was the best gift you have ever received?

If you could go on a vacation anywhere in the world, where would you like to go?

If you could travel back in time, which place in time would you like to visit?

What do you miss most about being a kid?

What was your favourite subject in school?

Who would you like to be your mentor, if you could choose anyone?

What’s your favourite movie or television series?

If you could be a Disney character and live in their movie world, who would you like to be?

What is your favourite book, and why?

What songs would be included on the soundtrack of your life?

I hope you have fun answering those questions :)

Creative people: Berlin based artist Vanessa

In today's post I would like to introduce you to the artist and friend Vanessa Puschmann, and show you some of her work - which always inspired me. 

Vanessa is a mixed media artist, working and living in Berlin. I met her when studying Art Therapy in Bremen, Germany. She left after a few terms to study cultural science, but we stayed friends.

With her background as a dressmaker and her theatre experience, she connected with the art scene in Bremen on various quirky projects:

“Sproutbau” (2007)
For one month about 70 international artists lived and worked together in a high-rise block, which was planned to be destroyed. 
Vanessa, as a part of the textile studio, and other artists worked towards a final festival week, to present exhibitions, readings, performances and concerts. 

“EphmerisKosMusTanten” (2008)
For one month artists installed a fictional temporary state "Ephmeristan" in an industrial building area. Different artists worked on various projects and prepared for events for the festivals final weekend. 
Vanessa was part of the fashion performance "EphmerisKosMusTanten", which was a collaboration project of 6 fashion designers, a make-up  artist and some experimental performers. She designed the costumes and also performed on stage.

After finishing her studies, Vanessa decided to move to Berlin. She quickly connected with the art scene and frequently participates in exhibitions and cultural events. 
As a mixed media artist she uses paintings, textile art and performance to explore questions of identity, physicality, spirituality and society. She works as a solo artist and also on collaboration projects.

Here are two recent projects of hers, which inspire my work.

"Kiezkinder" (2010)
Vanessa used old fabric, old clothes and every day materials to tell the stories of some characters of Berlin. Please find below some of her art puppets "Kiezkinder" (Children from the Berlin district Kiez).

Pepe and Joe

William, the Flying Fox

Oda, die Taube

Uschi & Freddie 

Kalle Strassenfuchs 

“Djangos fahrende Flickwerkstatt” (2012)
Textile artist Vanessa, photographer Effrosynio Kontogeorgou and writer Dorothea Ahlemeyer set of to Eastern Europe. With the medium of the puppet Django, they visited the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Bosnia and Croatia, and engaged with people on questions of happiness, sorrow, hope. Due to interaction with these people new puppets were created with found fabric and materials. The result was a patchwork of stories, pictures and experience, which is documented in an art book.
(Winner of the competition "kultur-im-dialog.moe 2012" - a programme of the Schering Foundation and the association MitOst e.V.)

Django Weltenbummler and his buddies

Django Weltenbummler

Mick Mücke from Berlin

Ludmilla from Bratislava

Lamela from Grgurici

Grrrgz wants to go home…

I had a opurtunity to interview Vanessa this week about her work and future projects, which you can read below:

What do puppets mean for you as an art medium?
I love to think about identity and to create them. The puppets are one possibility to do this. And I can create what I want. I love it, when they look like real personalities, when you feel them. 
The thing with the puppets grew out of a birthday present for a friend. I did it with another friend of mine. I liked to do it and tried more and then more ideas came, e.g. using text to describe their character and it was a feast to do, and to see what happens with the different puppets.

Did you depict typical Berlin inhabitants?
Some of them YES. "Kalle Straßenfuchs" (I created him together with my boyfriend) is one who lived all of his life on the streets of Berlin. He had so many adventures in his life but also some accidents, you can see the wounds on his body. He lost the half of his tail in fight with a car... So yes, you can find them on the streets. In Berlin you see lots of different characters. I really like it! Of course I'm inspired by this diversity. My puppets are mostly inspired by people of the districts of Kreuzberg, Neukölln and Friedrichshain.

Can you tell me more about the puppets which were created on "Django's Journey"?
The puppets are made of old fabrics and stuff from people who gave it to me as a present. The puppets Lamella and Ludmilla were part of an art and culture project in 2012 "Djangos Journey". The idea was to meet people around the Balkans, talk to them, listen to their stories, get some personal stuff from them and create a puppet out of the people we met. So every place has a character with its own identity, including every story, every person we met and of course my interpretation and artistic view.
As a frame to our trip we had the story of puppet Django, he is an adventurer and loves to travel! I created him in 2011 as a present for my friend Doro, after a while he inspired us to this project. Ludmilla was made in Bratislava. She was the fourth puppet. And she looks like a traditional woman. Lamella was the last one, I made her together with Grrrrgs. For me both were the hardest puppets to create. It was at the end of the trip and I was full of stories and experiences. It was hot and I was really tired. I had real problems, but when they were born, I was so happy! I loved them. I had the feeling, Grrrrgs was my first child.

Where do you find the materials to create the puppets and will your future work include puppets as an art medium?
I use old stuff, old fabrics, plastic... different things with their own histories. People give things to me or I find them on the streets or somewhere else. The material inspires me. My newest puppet, called "Alienfounding", is made out of an old dress I made, and I think it started a new way of creating puppets for me. The dress (which I loved) was made of white wool with a hood. After a time I decided to dye it brown. Unfortunately I forgot it was wollen and after I washed it, it shrunk to a child size - Shit. So I cried and thought about what to do... and the idea of the puppet came to me. It's a tribute to my old dress. 
The new thing is, that it's bigger and not so cute - it's more spooky. I began taking photos of it and I think, I will go in new ways directions from here. Perhaps I will do take more photos or make a small film - I'm not sure yet, but I'm positive that the ideas will come to me!

If you want to know more about her work, please check out her website and Facebook page:

Vanessa's website
Vanessa's Facebook page

My favorite arty-handmade indie music clips

My brother Michael visited me last week and I had an awesome time showing him Newcastle and the surrounding area. He dedicated some time to do a few updates on my blog and now I am connected with Pinterest, Facebook and Bloglovin. I'm still learning so much on blogging right now, but it's good to have these box now ticked.

I will start blogging more frequently than once a week. I have lots of ideas and I can't wait to share them.

For today, I want to post my Top 3 arty-handmade indie music clips. 

Peter Licht - Neue Idee

Peter Licht is an indie electropop musician and author from Germany. He is best known  for his 2001 single "Sonnendeck", winning the Ingeborg-Bachmann Preis 2007 with his short story "Die Geschichte meiner Einschätzung am Anfang des dritten Jahrtausends" and his published book "Wir werden siegen!", which is full of quirky sketches, thoughts and poems. 

The song "Neue Idee" came out 2011. The musicclip was made by the student Amelie Lihl of the Bauhaus-University Weimar. She used a  technic to perforate paper with a needle and illuminate the paper with back lighting She used several hundred single pictures to turn them into a little film. It's beautiful.

If you want to see a short making of, please have a look at the link below. It shows Amelie Lihl while working on perforating the paper and then taking photos to turn it into a film. http://vimeo.com/28145196


Breakboot - Baby I'm Yours feat. Irfane
Thibaut Berland is known by his stage name Breakbot and is a french producer and DJ.
The song "Baby I'm yours" came out 2010. The watercolour pictures were painted by Irina Dakeva, who put together ca. 2000 pictures to turn them into this music clip. I love the colours and well, the tune!

Laserkraft 3D - Nein, Mann!
Laserkraft 3D is a German Electro-House project. Both members Niels Reinhard and Tim Hoffmann studied digital media before they became famous as musicians. For their second single "Nein, Mann", they directed their own music clip with effects of ultraviolet light. It's a simple but funny video and it became so popular on YouTube, that the song entered the German Dance charts in autumn 2010.

Three friends from Germany and a new little fabric friend - Camilla

Last week I had my friends over from Germany whom I met during my Art Therapy study.
It was great, not one night did we ever watch television - instead we flicked through my craft books and Molly Makes magazines. Inspired, Amalia started to make her own crochet collar. Stine and I experimented with the sewing machine and finally figured out how to use the free motion embroidery foot and how to achieve the correct needle tension. Mike started embroidering fabrics with Zombies and other quirky designs.

Letzte Woche hatte ich Besuch von meinen Freunden aus Deutschland, die ich während meines Kunsttherapie Studiums kennengelernt habe. Er war großartig, wir haben nicht einen Abend ferngesehen. Stattdessen haben wir durch meine Kunstbücher und Molly Makes Zeitschriften geblättert. Davon inspiriert, fing Amalia an einen Spitzenkragen zu häkeln. Stine und Ich experimentierten mit der Nähmaschine und fanden schliesslich heraus wie man den Stickfuss für die Nähmaschine verwendet und die Garnspannung einstellt. Mike hingegen stickte Zombies und andere witzige Designs auf  verschiedene Stoffe.

Also, a new friend named Camilla turned up. She was noticed hiding keys, tickets and mobile phones - she had lots of fun, keeping us entertained. After the visitors left, she felt a bit bored and I saw her writing long letters to her family, and she is now trying now to convince her relatives to move into our house.

Außerdem tauchte eine neue Freundin mit dem Namen Camilla auf. Sie machte sich bemerkbar in dem sie unsere Schlüssel, Tickets und Mobile Telefone versteckte - sie hatte jede Menge Spaß, uns zu beschäftigen. Nachdem der Besuch nach Hause gefahren war, wurde ihr etwas langweilig und ich sah sie lange Briefe an ihre Familie schreiben,  welche sie nun davon überzeugen versucht, zu uns ins Haus zu ziehen.