Born in New York to an Italian father and an African-American mother, Jonas Carpignano grew up in New York and Rome. With his first Mediterranean film he won the Gotham Independent Film Awards 2015 as "revelation director" and the National Board of Review Awards 2015 as "best debut director", and he also received two nominations for the 2016 Independent Spirit Awards in categories "best debut film" and "best debut script". His second film A Ciambra (2017) was presented at the Cannes Film Festival 2017 where it won the Europa Cinema Label Prize in the Quinzaine des Réalisateurs section, and was officially selected as Italy’s submission for the Academy Awards for Best Foreign Language Film in 2018.