San Iker
As everyone knows, the World Cup starts in just under a month. For photographer Ryu Voelkel, it’s the beginning of his plan to produce a football photography book “like no other”.
Ryu, who has been shooting football since 2005, plans to venture to Brazil with the aid of a Kickstarter project to back his book, which will showcase his images from both inside and outside the World Cup stadia, as well as showing the darker backdrop to the global pageant.
Ryu told me that it is “the atmosphere” that attracts him to football: “It’s more than a sport, it’s entertainment. No one game is the same.” Crowd reaction also plays a big part in Ryu’s work and, again, it is something special about how the fans react to what happens in the course of a game that makes football so special for photography: “It’s so overwhelmingly over the top. One goal means a lot more than other sports”.
I asked Ryu what he hoped to find in Brazil that is new or different from his normal experience of photographing football? He explained that there is something unique about the relationship between football and Brazil, real and, perhaps, imagined too, which he wanted to explore: “I want to really find out what makes Brazil a footballing nation. We romanticize the notion of Brazil being a football country. Brazil is synonymous with football, but why? Is this the only place in the world where winning is secondary and playing the game beautifully is the priority?” Ryu hopes that his stint at the heart of the world’s greatest tournament, in the country perhaps most universally associated with the passion and spectacle of the game, will shed light on those questions.
Neymar, mobbed by fans.
I asked Ryu a bit about his personal relationship with the game too. He doesn’t support one team specifically, though he read and enjoyed Fever Pitch before coming to London six years ago and retains an interest in how Arsenal are doing. Though he also follows Japan and Germany, he told me that he “support[s] players more than teams. I go and shoot Real Madrid because I support Ronaldo. Same goes for Zlatan or Balotelli.” He jokes, “I’m very superficial like that”, but goes to on to explain that, as a photographer, this approach makes sense: “I guess I see shooting football as an individual sport with superstars. Without them, football will be so dull.”
Ryu intends to exhibit his work in the future, but his priority is getting the images ready for a book. This might lead to the interest and financial backing that facilitate exhibiting his work in a gallery, which is an expensive and difficult process.
Drogba soars.
Though Ryu does other commercial work, the vast majority of his work is sports-related. For him, it’s the passion and the unpredictability that make shooting sports such an engaging process: “I really do love sports because you just don’t know what’s going to happen next.” Ryu is also working on projects beyond the world of football: “I’m working on shooting portraits of baseball players in the Caribbean at the moment and if it all goes well, I’ll be able to do an exhibition in the future.”
There’s no doubt that this exciting and timely World Cup project will bring Ryu to an even wider global audience. Don’t forget to check out the Kickstarter page and support Ryu in his endeavours and be part of what promises to be an excellent and beautiful collection of images.
Visit Ryu’s website here. All images courtesy of Ryu Voelkel. Thanks to Paul French for his assistance.
Put Niels In Goal 