June Givanni, a pioneering film curator, writer and programmer of African and African diaspora cinema, as well as the founder of The June Givanni PanAfrican Archive (JGPACA), will receive BAFTA‘s Outstanding British Contribution to Cinema honor at the 2024 BAFTA Film Awards next month.
The special award is presented to individuals or organizations that have made “a significant and inspiring contribution to film through a particular project or work – with focus on recognizing work that might not otherwise be eligible in BAFTA’s competitive awards’ categories,” the British Academy highlighted.
Based in London, the JGPACA is a volunteer-run archive amassed by Givanni over 40 years as part of her curatorial work and is dedicated to preserving the history of pan-African and Black British cinema and culture. It comprises more than 10,000 rare and unique artifacts documenting the development of filmmaking across Africa and the African diaspora, including in Britain. BAFTA highlighted that it has grown to become one of the largest independent archives in the U.K.
“June has been a pioneering force in the preservation, study and celebration of African and African Diaspora cinema and Black British cultural heritage,” said BAFTA CEO Jane Millichip. “We are so pleased to be able to shine a light on June’s work at the EE BAFTA Film Awards next month, including her extraordinary archive and the filmmakers and stories within it.”
Said Givanni: “I was shocked and am honored to receive such recognition from BAFTA for work that I have been privileged to be able to do with some of the most inspired and inspiring people in the world of cinema generally and Pan African cinema and culture in particular; especially with the energies of the younger generation of thinkers, curators and artists who bring dynamic energies to working with, and discovering, the archives of the moving image from a pre-digital age.”
Givanni began her career as the coordinator of Third Eye London’s first Festival of Third World Cinema and part of the organizing team, led by Parminder Vir, based at the Greater London Council’s Ethnic Minorities Unit.
She went on to set up and run the African Caribbean Film Unit at the BFI and become co-founding editor, with Gaylene Gould, of the quarterly Black Film Bulletin created there. She also programmed the Planet Africa offering at the Toronto International Film Festival over four years. Givanni has worked as a film curator on five continents, “programming for TV channels and festivals from Martinique to Kerala – helping to progress the study of pan-African cinema globally,” BAFTA said. She has also published books, including Remote Control: Dilemmas of Black Intervention in British Film and TV and Symbolic Narratives/African Cinema: Audiences, Theory and the Moving Image.
Other recent BAFTA special awards recipients have included Shonda Rhimes and Billy Connolly. Previous Outstanding British Contribution to Cinema honor recipients include Andy Serkis, the National Film and Television School, as well as BBC Films.
The BAFTA Film Awards ceremony, hosted by David Tennant, will take place on Feb. 18 at the Southbank Centre’s Royal Festival Hall in London.