Sirkka-Liisa Konttinen moved to the Byker area of Newcastle in 1970 and shortly after her arrival she began to capture the spirit of the community in evocative photographs that formed the basis of a book and film. Since leaving Byker in 1976, Sirkka has maintained contact with the area and its many residents who have become her friends. BYKER REVISITED is a visual and verbal documentary, a portrait of a contemporary community that is in flux - a community of the poor, the disadvantaged and the refugees who demonstrate a life-affirming humanity which is captured in their words and Sirkka's stunning photographs. . 

‘The photos and humour, ugliness and beauty, the casual and the formal of Byker Revisited, all conspire to reveal a world where we do not conform, where we do not have to simply be one thing, where life is complex and contradictory. That Sirkka has found this in this new book as clearly as she did in the old is why she is a brilliant artist.’ Lee Hall, writer of ‘Billy Elliot’ and ‘Pitmen Painters’

‘Most of the most successful photobooks about Englishness or Britishness are those that examine a community or locality, often though the close links that the photographer has with the area. Sirkka-Liisa Konttinen's Byker Revisited is a fine example.’ British Journal of Photography

‘Byker Revisited is a collection of intimate portraits asking us to 'imagine, if you were to put your life in just one picture, what would you have in it?' The images tell colourful, moving and honest stories of lives, fully lived, hidden, inside an urban flux.’ Narc magazine

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