biography
Elsbeth Juda / Jay - b.1911
Elsbeth Juda was born in Darmstadt, Germany, 2nd May 1911. In 1931 she married Hans Juda and in 1933 they moved to London. Elsbeth studied photography under Lucia Moholy formerly of the Bauhaus and started her long career in a commercial studio as “dark room boy”. In 1940, Hans became founding publisher and editor of The Ambassador, The British Export Magazine. Elsbeth (known professionally as Jay) would later join the magazine as associate editor and photographer.
With the exception of Churchill, the photographs in this exhibition were taken by Elsbeth for The Ambassador. As the magazine said itself of this remarkable photographer in its special Coronation Issue in 1953: “Here is the least photographed and the most photographing member of the Ambassador Organization. Indeed the words Photos by Jay are not missing from many of our illustrated pages, but nobody should be allowed to imagine that her resources end here. Jay is also the most fashion-wise of fashion editors and when it comes to hustling models in and out of areoplanes, anywhere from the Myer emporium in Melbourne to little shop in the Brazilian jungle; Jay is the girl to do it. Pages 93 to 108 will give new readers a vague idea about the exasperating activity of our roving colleague.”
