SUSE BYK

Born around 1885, Suse Byk was a high-profile photographer based in Berlin. Byk joined the Photographic Association of Berlin in 1910 and attended the first conference of German Women Photographers at the Berlin Women’s Club in 1913. In the 1910s, she took over the studio of Ernst Sandau (1880-1918), where she apprenticed Martha Maas (1893-1970) in 1916 and Lore Feininger (1901-1991) in 1919. In 1927, she married the philosopher and playwright Hellmuth Falkenfeld (1893-1954). However, the couple were forced to flee Berlin in 1938. Byk sold her studio to Liselotte Strelow (1908-1981) but all her archives were destroyed during the Second World War. Byk and Falkenfeld emigrated to New York via Rotterdam and London, where they lived on East 98th Street. She died on 10th September 1943.