Byker Project book/film –
According to Wikipedia Konttinen was born in Finland but has worked in Britain since the 1960s. She started as an apprentice to a fashion photographer and moved to Newcastle in 1969 where she photographed and interviewed the local residents of ‘Byker’, the name of the area and her first book.
The book first published in 1985 represents over 12 years of work. The project documents the lives and conditions of the people who lived on these Northern housing estates until local councils demolished for new housing developments. This book documents the loss of a community, unlike the people of Skinningrove who managed to resist the local council the people of Byker were not but this was not for the lack of trying on the council’s side. The council encouraged participation by setting the Architect responsible for the new development in an empty shop to try and engage with the locals, having open hours for the residents to come in and discuss the project. Following redevelopment only 20% of the original residents returned to the area.
When you look at the images you can feel this community, its hard and rough but people pull together, help each other out, through thick and thin, through employment and the downtimes. True the conditions were not good but these were people’s homes, with memories and hopes and in a similar way the village of Ngawi has that same feeling. The residents are close, everyone knows everyone’s business, they look out for themselves and I believe that if the Greater Wellington Council tried to intervene then they would resist just like the people of Skinningrove.
“In a huge city, it is a fairly common observation that the dwellers in a slum are almost a separate race of people with different values, aspirations and ways of being. One result of slum clearance is that a considerable movement of people takes place over long distances, with devastating effect on the social groupings built up over years. But one might argue that this is a good thing when we are dealing with people who have no initiative or civic pride. The task is surely to break up such groupings, even though the people seem to be satisfied with their miserable environment and seem to enjoy an extrovert social life in their locality.” (Wilfrid Burns, 1963)
In 2003, Konttinen returned to the area and re-photographed the area and produced a film. There is an immediate contrast to her earlier work, gone are the narrow streets and back-to-back houses of the Victorian times, they are replaced with security doors and intercom systems, three is a clear feeling of loneliness and isolation. There’re no children playing in the streets, no music, no local pub, its soulless.
Bibliography
Websites (accessed 27/04/2020)
https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/sirkka-liisa-konttinen-9246
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sirkka-Liisa_Konttinen
https://www.amber-online.com/collection/byker/
https://www.artimage.org.uk/artists/k/sirkka-liisa-konttinen/
Michele Usher 