The Festival of Crafts in the Buda Castle and the Street of Magyar Ízek await those interested in the area in front of the Várkert Bazaar on the lower quay in Buda. The events until Sunday are free to attend.
The 36th Crafts Festival, the country's largest folk art festival, will be organized this year with the participation of around a thousand domestic and foreign craftsmen. South Korea will be the guest of honor, and the main theme of the festival will be crafts related to woodwork. At the festival, in the visual workshops, visitors can learn about the mysteries of ancient trades and get a glimpse of the work of the craft communities of the Carpathian Basin.
At the festival, children's programs and old-time folk games are offered to the little ones, while adults are welcomed to a fashion show, a dance hall and a folk pub in the Burgrváros part of Buda Castle, on the Árpád Tóth promenade, Táncsics Mihály és Tárnok utca and through Szentáromság tér to Dísz tér.
In the workshops of Korean craftsmen, visitors can learn about traditional folk crafts: calligraphy, temple and folk painting, Korean quilting, pyrography, ceramic art and paper weaving. The Korean Cultural Center also prepares stage productions: twice a day on the main stage, the public is welcomed with shows, traditional musical instruments, dances and rhythms. Those interested can admire Korean national costumes, hanboks, at a fashion show.
In connection with the main theme of the festival, woodcraft, there will be, among other things, carving of headstones, making of turtles, wooden spoons, chairs, flutes and bark vessels, carving of gateposts and carving of shepherd's fans from Zala. Various woodcarving decorative techniques, the wedge technique, spaining, convex carving and scratching are presented.
Among others, Balázs Szokolay Dongó, Andrea Navratil and their band, MazsiMó – GipsyMó, and Fitos Dezső Társulat will present their show A Falu on the main stage at Szentáromság tér.
On the Árpád Tóth Promenade, there will be a dance hall in the Folk pub, several performances and storytelling, ringers, stilt walkers and stuntmen will create a fair atmosphere all day long. On August 20, St. Stephen's Day and the Feast of the New Bread are greeted with a blessing of bread and a procession of the masters.
As part of the Saint Stephen's Day celebrations, Magyar Ízek Utcá offers gastronomic specialties as well as family programs and concerts. Cereals will play the main role this year, but you can also taste Hungary's cake and sugar-free cake, as well as St. Stephen's Day bread.
At the 12th event, almost 200 people cook the special dishes of Hungary and the Carpathian Basin on the banks of the Danube. In addition to Bogyszló knuckle tripe, Szatmár stuffed cabbage, Karcag mutton stew, pinched carp and many other fish preparations, there are also dishes from Vojvodina, Roma and Csangó. They will also offer sparhelten pies, langalos and stuffed langalos.
They will be made with cabbage soup and poppy seed cakes from Mátyusföld, pepper soup from Subcarpathia, and donuts filled with homemade plum jam from the village of Nagymuzsaly. The team from Pusztina, a village in Csangó, Moldavia, led by ethnographer Tinka Nyisztor, prepares grape leaf töltiki. You can taste the shepherd's food of the Great Plains, öhön and sokácbab. From Vojvodina, the public can get to know the soup of the South Danube fish juice makers, and from Őrség, dödöll sprinkled with pumpkin seed oil.
In addition to fizzy drinks and syrups, 8-10 types of Hungarian craft beers, fruit wines, meads, herbal teas and some typical Hungarian brandies await visitors. New this year is the Garden of Handmade Cosmetics, where handmade products from Hungarian ingredients are presented.
The program includes a performance by a puppet company, storytellers, craftspeople and a concert by Judit Halász on the opening day. There will be concerts on the stage in the evenings: György Ferenczy and the 1st Pesti Rackák, the Hot Jazz Band and the Csík band will also perform.
The Hungarian Red Cross organizes a blood drive, and the Egy Csepp Figyelem Alapítvány welcomes visitors with a free blood sugar test, but there will also be blood pressure and body composition measurements.
The Hungarian Bakers' Association organized its bread competition for the eleventh time, the winners of which can be tasted on Magyar Ízek Utcá, as well as the cake with the fanciful name of the Huncut Plum Prince, which won the title of Hungary's cake this year.
On the weekend of August 20, domestic design will take center stage in Bálna, while literature will take center stage on the Nehru Bank: author evenings, reading theater performances and concerts will also be organized in the Művészkert. the texts of Géza Bereményi, one of the most popular prose and screenwriters in contemporary Hungarian literature, will be interpreted by Róbert Hrutka and Anikó Für. The audience can also meet János Háy, András Kepes and Otto Tolnai on the Danube bank, and the concerts include the Balázs Szabó Band, as well as performances by the Lázár brothers, Platon Karataev and Ohnody.
Two film premieres will also be shown in the Artists' Garden. The work Frici & Aranka takes viewers back to Budapest at the beginning of the 19th century, evoking the sparkling life of the capital and the flourishing café culture through the love of Karinthy Frigyes and Böhm Aranka. The short film Külün Falka, which won the main prize of this year's Hungarian Motion Picture Festival, shows the meeting of a father and his daughter in prison. The host of the Art Garden will be writer Anna Juhász, the announcement states.
In Bálna, fashion and design will play a leading role. On August 20 and 21, visitors are welcomed with varied programs, who can take part in craft activities, sustainability programs, and attention-grabbing round table discussions. At the workshops, both children and adults can get to know the Hungarian fashion and design designers. Thanks to the presentations and discussions, a more direct relationship and a real dialogue can develop between those working in the profession and those interested in the domestic design industry, the announcement states.
Source: Magyar Hírlap
Image: MTI (archive)
