James Barnor, the Ghanaian photographer whose career spans seven decades, is to receive the Outstanding Contribution to Photography award from the World Photography Organisation, Euronews reports. The prize will be presented in London in April 2027, followed by a show of more than 50 of his pictures at Somerset House.
Barnor opened his Ever Young studio in Accra’s Jamestown in 1953 and, as the Daily Graphic’s first staff photographer, recorded Ghana’s journey to independence in 1957. After moving to London in 1959 he photographed the city’s African community for Drum magazine, giving Black Londoners a visibility they rarely had in print.
He returned home in 1970 and helped set up Ghana’s first commercial colour-processing laboratory. Now 97, he has work in the collections of Tate, the National Portrait Gallery and the Centre Pompidou, and this award recognises a body of work that documents a changing world with warmth and style.
Source: Euronews