Asmara
Berlin – Steffi Graf, the 22-time Grand Slam-winning tennis player, has turned her focus from the tennis court to the focal length and perspective control of a camera publishing her first photo-reportage on Friday.
Under the title ‘The Children of Asmara’ the 40-year-old mother of two’s photographs represent the lives of kids living in the capital of Eritrea.
The German-language edition of National Geographic Magazine has published the pictures together with an article about her work in Eritrea.
Graf, who runs a foundation for the mental health of children called ‘Children for Tomorrow’, said that ‘I am not a person of many words,’ according to a statement from her publisher.
She said that as a teenager she had seriously considered becoming a photographer, rather than pursuing a career in tennis. Graf was accompanied on her trip to Asmara by seasoned photo- journalist Gerd Ludwig, who instructed her in the art.
In 2007, she travelled to Asmara to inaugurate the first Kindergarten of ”Children for Tomorrow”. Steffi must have been deeply moved by the kindness she experienced from the Eritrean people living in poverty. After her trip she said,
“The friendliness and joyfulness of the Eritrean people is something to see considering their truly unbelievable conditions but I was still personally dismayed how much the children especially suffer from the economic problems of the country.”
