The enthusiasm and passion with which soccer is played in Africa are inevitably transferred to the onlooker. Internationally successful fashion and advertising photographer Thomas Hoeffgen (*1968 in Kiel) experienced the same thing when he flew to Nigeria in 1999 for a story on soccer. He became so interested in the subject that he spent the next several years taking unusual, direct photographs of players and spectators in Nigeria, Namibia, Botswana, Zambia, Malawi, and South Africa. Hoeffgen’s images take us from the continent’s typical improvised sandlots with their two wooden posts forming a makeshift goal to the concrete stadiums in the city with their floodlights and grandstands. Remarkably honest photographs, since no one takes notice of the man behind the camera—the only thing that counts here is the game.
 
Exhibition schedule: Auswärtiges Amt, Berlin, April 30–June 2, 2010 | Deutsche Akademie für Fußball-Kultur, Künstlerhaus im KunstKulturQuartier, Nuremberg, June 5–July 18, 2010