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John Akomfrah is a filmmaker who has won critical acclaim both in Britain and in the USA for his features and documentary work. His latest feature Digitopia, premiered this year at the Venice and Toronto festivals. In 1982 he helped found the Black Audio Film Collective, the seminal black filmmaking workshop, which for fifteen years produced a broad range of critically acclaimed work winning over thirty-five international awards. John came to prominence in 1986 when he directed Handsworth Songs, which explores the contours of race and civil disorder in 1980s Britain. The film won seven international awards including the bfi's Grierson Award for Best Documentary. In 1998 John directed the bfi Production title, Speak Like A Child.

John has lectured throughout the world on black British cinema in a range of institutions including: the California Institute of Arts; the Art College of Chicago; the Tisch School of Art, New York; The London Institute; and the Universities of London and Ulster. He has also written extensively on film theory and aesthetics, is a member of the PACT Cultural Diversity Panel and sits on the Advisory Committee of the Sheffield International Documentary Festival.

Feature films
2001 Digitopia
2000 A Death In The Family
1999 Riot
1998 Speak Like a Child
1993 Who Needs a Heart


Documentaries
2001 Prostitutes
2000 Stalkers
1997 Martin Luther King - Days of Hope
1995 The Last Angel of History The Cheese and the Worms;
African Political Broadcasts;
1994 African Footsteps; Lush Life
1993 Seven Songs for Malcolm X
1991 A Touch of the Tarbrush
1988 Testament
1986 Handsworth Songs


For a more detailed overview of his work see the filmography on the website of Slate, the London based alliance of documentary film makers.