Legends Deserve Flowers: The Legacy of James Barnor
The pioneering—yet until recently overlooked—photographer has lensed over six decades of meaningful work.
Some of us are born to be bridges—connections between what came before us and the futures we are destined to create. James Barnor is one of the most important bridges of our time. He is a living archive, a link between the birth of photography in West Africa and the development of the discipline for the modern era. In the almost 92 years Barnor has spent on this planet—living mostly between Ghana and the UK—he has captured aspects of African and Black life that are meaningful to the people who live it, and often may not have been recorded otherwise: everyday moments such as merchant women selling wares in the market, people getting on and off the bus, teenagers hanging out together, early images of Kwame Nkrumah (Ghana’s first President), and even the introduction of color photo processing to his region of the African continent.
Barnor attributes much of his journey to luck, but it may be more accurate to describe it as a divine or blessed path, though not without its bumps along the road. At around 10 years old, Barnor was taken in by his mother’s eldest brother, who made sure he was raised in a safe and nurturing environment. It was here that he was gifted his first camera: a large, heavy, wooden machine that his uncle had used to capture life in rural areas of Ghana. But his uncle didn’t teach the young Barnor how to work it (that would occur during an apprenticeship he took on elsewhere), but rather instructed him to “use the equipment as you see fit.” That first camera was a door that Barnor walked through and has been running forward from ever since. For the majority of his life, Barnor has moved from a place of purpose, and with the understanding that his photographic work is much bigger than the production of images; it is his calling to connect with his subjects, to create space for them to be free, and to capture their essence for the record, for the sake of our existence as Black and African peoples, and for what has become an important archive of the lives he has interacted with over the course of his own long and rich life.
On March 6, 1957, the nation known today as Ghana gained its independence from British colonial rule, marking a growing tide of independence movements across the continent. In the capital city of Accra, where Barnor grew up, many waves of change occurred, including an upgraded bus system. Recalling today, Barnor describes the busyness of the capital city and how the municipal bus system transported people throughout the metropolitan area and its suburbs, as well as the enhancement of its technology, evidence of which we see in the suited conductor issuing paper tickets detailing the price and distance which each passenger was travelling. Barnor also notes elements of interaction between different classes, which is apparent in the dress and accessories of the woman on the far right in contrast to the other passengers. In regard to the people looking directly into the lens, Barnor recalls the excitement and curiosity when he showed up with a camera; after all, Barnor was the nation’s first newspaper photographer and, when people saw him, many understood that their image could potentially appear in the next day’s publication. “Oh yes...somebody with a camera coming, you know, people would ask, ‘What are you shooting for?’ By all means, everybody looks at you,” he says.
As a young person, Barnor was active in Youth Development Clubs and other social activities organized for young people in Accra. In this image, he captured some new and old friends during a camping- style party hosted at the Boy Scout Headquarters in the capital city. At the center of the group is someone Barnor was less familiar with, but remembered as a classmate and one of the first trained health workers in the country; on her left is E. Quarshie Blavo, a prominent Scout and youth leader who was “always coming up with ideas to get the youth united and to learn and do things and give service;” to her right is another friend of Barnor’s, Mr. Kitson-Mills who worked as a Tax Controller. Barnor was also part of developing the youth hostel system in Ghana, which offered affordable options for young Ghanaians who wanted to travel and get better acquainted with all their home country had to offer.
Perhaps the biggest revolution in Barnor’s career was his transition to color photography and processing. After receiving an affirming letter from his affectionately nicknamed role model, “Joy,” Barnor made his first trip to the UK in 1959, where he would stay for the entirety of the 1960s. During that decade, Barnor began to experiment with color photography, which he asserts “made me what I am today.” Barnor started freelancing for the iconic magazine Drum in the early 1950s after being introduced to its proprietor when the company expanded from South Africa to Ghana. Speaking of the models he shot for Drum, Barnor shares that he came to them through a mix of meeting people along the way and receiving assignments from an editor. He believes he was assigned to photograph Hallowi due to her growing involvement in small films and other media—“We got on very well,” he recalls. In this image, Hallowi sits in the passenger seat of a convertible she had driven with her then-boyfriend from London to Kent, where Barnor was living at the time. To compose this experimental cover photograph, Barnor flipped his two-lens camera upside down, held it at a high angle, and looked through the viewfinder from below as opposed to the typical top view. “You should know what you want,” Barnor says of the clarity he brought to his photographic work, as well as his overall perspective on life. On the topic of his sitters, Barnor says children were his favorite because they made him feel “on top of the world.”
At 24 years old, Muhammad Ali, then the heavyweight champion of the world, was scheduled to defend his title against Brian London in the UK’s capital in 1966. Barnor was commissioned by Drum to capture Ali during his preparation for the big fight. “I didn’t talk to him at all. I should have asked him to do this or that for me. I’m sure that he would have done anything I asked him to do—’turn this way’ or ‘you do that,’ he would have done it. But he was so fascinating," Barnor says of photographing the young star. Consistent with his intuitive spirit, Barnor chose to focus on the icon’s back rather than his face. “Nobody would have thought of photographing somebody’s back,” he recalls. Barnor shot this image with a Mamiya he had acquired from trading the camera he came to London with following the completion of his studies at Medway College of Art in Kent.
Typically, when on assignment for Drum, Barnor would shoot his models outside in active poses and with varied backgrounds. To shoot Constance Mulondo, the session was staged entirely in a studio. “I shot a whole roll…I knew my camera, I knew my film, and I had the studio to myself,” Barnor shares. He also remembers Mulondo speaking about her love of music, dance, and bands, so he arranged for them to meet a local band that was performing at London University. Ultimately, he wasn’t able to shoot her in action with the band, as he had envisioned, due to a gig they had later that day, but was able to take pictures of her with them.
Barnor is a living archive, a link between the birth of photography in West Africa and the development of the discipline for the modern era.
Today, Barnor’s vigor for photography and connecting with people is still very much alive. He is pleased to be opening paths for Black photographers, particularly young ones who he hopes will be inspired by his images to continue with their own work. Of his own career, Barnor bittersweetly says, “I wish the recognition that I’m getting now had come to me when I was about 65. And I wish when I was 60, 65, 70, my work was regarded as ‘iconic,’ or whatever people call it now. Then I would have had the chance to approach people for assignments and I would not have been taken for granted. And I’d have been able to buy the type of equipment I needed or wanted, and sold pictures at places that understood my work. It’s late, but it’s better late than never.” Perhaps one of the greatest lessons to be learned from Barnor’s journey is the importance of nurturing, cultivating, and honoring Black art while the artists can truly enjoy the fruits of their labor. There is more room for possibility when we have the tools and the support we need to live purposeful and transformative lives. Barnor is clear that we should all receive a “basic education;” this involves learning how to read and write, learning how to learn, and having access to supportive spaces facilitated by people who can open one’s mind to possibility. Barnor continued to do photographic work and hone his craft, despite challenges, because he understood that it was part of what he was meant to do in this lifetime. We celebrate you, James Barnor. We must give people their flowers (when they can enjoy them most).
