Amber Online

Amber is a film & photography collective based in Newcastle upon Tyne in the North of England. Amber Films, Side Gallery and Cinema are all part of it. This website brings together a full sense of the activity, history and collections for the first time...

Current Activity and Amber Films are self-explanatory - both come with clips. The Side Photographic Collection is in Photography. Check out what's on at Side Gallery and Side Cinema. Find out about Amber History - we're 40 next May; buy our films, books, prints & posters at the Online Shop; register if you want comment on any of the work. Join the Amber Forum (you need to register separately for this) and keep in contact by signing up for our RSS feeds.

February on SideTV

The February feature is Amber's 2001 film Like Father - three generations, a grandfather, father and son in the aftermath of pit closure in East Durham. The story draws on that of the listed pigeon cree in Ryhope, the subject of Meerkat's beautiful 2008 documentary Homing Instinct which, in an inspired piece of SideTV programming, can be seen on Channel 2. Pigeon man Jackie Surtees is in both films. Crossing the Pennines, Channel 3 presents the wonderful Face Off, Bryan Dixon/Coachroad Films documentary exploration of the world gurning championships at Egremont's Crab Fair. And if you want a bit more treasured eccentricity, on Channel 4 there's Amber's early film Mai, a loving portrait of the irrepressible Mai Finglass, collector extraordinary and landlady to some of the film students at Regents Street Polytechnic who formed the Amber collective. Jellyfish on Channel 5 is an early Amber animation by Peter Roberts - anxiety on the beach and a kind of forebear for Amber's The Writing in the Sand. T Dan Smith is back on Channel 6's latest episode of Mouth of the Tyne - this month he talks about the development of Newcastle's housing policy in the late 50s. Sirkka-Liisa Konttinen continues her SideTalk exploration of Byker Revisited on Channel 7 and on Channel 8 Irena Carlton gives us beautifully simple, fantastically tasty Squid in Red Wine in The Bosnian Kitchen. All your internet audio-visual needs! Watch it and spread the word! SideTV

Byker Revisited

Sirkka-Liisa Konttinen's Byker Revsited: Portrait of a Community, published by Northumbria Press (£30) is now available from our online shop and from the gallery. Sirkka created her seminal documentation of Byker in the 1970s, photographing the community into which she had move when Amber came to Tyneside in 1969. It became an exhibition, a book and an Amber film. From 2003 to 2009 she returned to the Byker Wall Estate that replaced it, developing portraits in collaboration with the new communities. The book brings both bodies of work together in a unique document of change. If you need convincing, you can look at the old photographs here and some of the new ones here.

Brian Hogg

Brian Hogg in Eden Valley
Hoggy, one of Amber's favourite actors, one of Amber's favourite people and a real friend of the collective died on Monday 19 October. Over the last fifteen or so years you could make a good argument for him being the face of Amber films. He'd been dealing with cancer for some time but, although weak and no longer able to speak, he came down to the gallery to see Sirkka's Byker Revisited exhibition just before he died, still able to share a joke even if it was scribbled on paper. It meant a huge amount to us. He first got involved with Amber as a driver and actor for Live Theatre, when Murray Martin and Sirkka were involved in touring their work. One of his great talents as a film actor was to merge with the terrtitories Amber was filming, whether it was working a fishing boat or being part of the trotting world. He was so good that after working on In Fading Light the fishermen actually offered him a job! In a change of programme, Amber is screening a tribute in November's SideTV season. As well as In Fading Light, Hoggy appeared in Dream On, Eden Valley, The Scar, Like Father and Shooting Magpies. He had bit parts in several other films. After Murray Martin died in 2007, Brian contributed to The Pursuit of Happiness, fondly reminiscing about his involvement in Amber's horsey films. Anyone wishing to leave a message can visit the Amber Forum.

Amber's Ellin Hare was one of the many who paid tribute to Brian at the funeral. Her address can be read here.