Johny Pitts is a self taught photographer, writer and broadcaster from Sheffield, England. A Northern Soul child, he is the product of an African American musician father and a white working class mother who taught English in the Yemeni community (they met at a working men’s club once owned by Peter Stringfellow). Johny struggles daily with an aching, problematic nostalgia for his brief stint living as a child in late 80s bubble-era Japan.
Timeline
Born: Sheffield, 1980s
2010: Establishes the online magazine afropean.com dedicated to the Black community in Europe
2012: A Bend in the River collaboration with Caryl Phillips for Art Angel. Afropean.com wins the ENAR (European Network Against Racism) Foundation Award.
2014: Publication of ‘The Thames Path’ with Cafe Royal Books.
2016: ‘Brexit Psychic Geography’; portraits of working class Sheffield featured on the New York Times Lens Blog, later included in the Reporters Without Borders annual 2017
2019: Publication of Afropean: Notes from Black Europe with Penguin. Winner of the Jhalak Prize, the Bread & Roses Award, the European Essay Prize and The Leipzig Book Award for European Understanding. A Guardian, New Statesman and BBC History Magazine Book of the Year. Translated into eight languages.
2020: Afropean: Travels in Black Europe, a series of photographs accompanying the book of the same name, given a solo exhibition at Foam Gallery, Amsterdam
2021: Guest editor of The Eyes issue 12: The B-Side, focusing on Black photographers in Europe. Chosen as one of Lens Culture’s photobooks of the year. Selected out of over 400 entrants as the recipient of the inaugural Ampersand Photoworks Fellowship for Mid-career photographers.
2022: Foam exhibition moves to Space 81 in Morges, Switzerland. In August, Johny’s first UK solo exhibition Home is not a Place opens at Graves Gallery, Sheffield. The accompanying book, a collaboration with the poet Roger Robinsons, published by Harper Collins. Selected as one of The Guardian’s Best Books of the Year.
Enquiries
Literary: Suresh Ariaratnam / suresh@sprungsultan.com
Voice: voices@hobsons-international.com
Other: info@afropean.com