[ Background and Travels ]

I grew up in Dresden, in East Germany. Photography and working with a camera was always an interest of mine - back then it was manual! Unfortunately, I didn’t have many opportunities for photography and travel back then - and of course, I was very young still.

Later, after the wall came down, I traveled extensively around the world. Everywhere I went, I always thought the most interesting part was contact with locals because I want to learn about the country, about how they were living. And more and more, I found that everyone always connected through football. Everywhere, football was a common language.

I have one really nice memory in Myanmar. Our hostel owner told us it was ‘cinema night’ and she helped us find the ‘cinema’. All of a sudden, we were standing in front of a barn and all I saw was orange. There were 300 or 400 monks, all dressed in orange - and in front of everyone were 2 TVs. They were watching Manchester City against Manchester United! I was in the middle of nowhere and watching football with all these monks. This really stuck in my mind, football is everywhere, you can watch anywhere and just start talking and connecting.

[ Combining Football and Photography ]

Whenever I traveled, photography was always with me, I always focused on people. Then in 2009, a friend of mine working as a consultant for streetfootballworld (now Common Goal) asked me if I’d be interested in joining them for a project in South Africa to document their work. They had a joint project with FIFA in Cape Town where they were opening the first Football for Hope center in the townships surrounding the city.

There were very young people, mainly from Africa and one team from Brazil. The week was full of different workshops and excursions and a football tournament at the end of the week. One day, we went to the Cape of Good Hope and this young girl asked me to take a photo of her. I still have this picture in my home. This was the beginning of everything.

Later that evening we organized an event where the kids could share their backgrounds, about themselves, how they got there, stuff like that. Then, this girl, her name is Lerato, stood and shared her story. It was shuddering. She came from a violent background and left home very young. She lived on the street where she was assaulted and contracted AIDS. She had tried to kill herself. Then, she found an organization called Grassroot Soccer, where she found a new family and some hope. At the time, she didn’t know if she would have long to live but decided, that even though her situation was so difficult, she wanted to give back and help others overcome their background and the issues they are dealing with.

For me, this was a ‘wow’ moment. It’s not about the 1 or 2% of football that we know from TV, that is connected to so much money - there’s a different part of football that can have a powerful impact on people’s lives, even saving them. I knew I wanted to do this - only I wanted to focus on women and female football. I found Lerato recently on social media and she’s still alive and living well in South Africa.

The same year, I met a woman in Berlin, Marlene and her sister Valerie told me about an organization they were running. They had friends in Iran and in 2006, they organized a match between a German team and the Iran women’s national team. They told me about the powerful experience they had there. It led to them founding DISCOVER FOOTBALL and I’ve been working with them ever since! We just celebrated 15 years of existence.

[ Before your travels had you been playing/interested in football? ]

I actually was a handball and volleyball player! But I always watched football - growing up in Dresden, there’s a big rivalry with Berlin so I was always watching and passionate about it. I even met Franz Beckenbauer once and had him sign my book!

So I was always connected and then when I started traveling, I realized how powerful football is. Since I started working with DISCOVER FOOTBALL, I’m also still engaged with Common Goal and other organizations like Equal Playing Field, which are all working in the area of change related to football.

[ Can you talk a little about your philosophy, or mission, as a photojournalist? ]

In general and when I’m working with DISCOVER FOOTBALL for example, our main focus is bringing women together from all over the world - especially from areas which are either difficult or impossible to play football.

Over the years, we’ve had many women here in Germany but also held tournaments in Lebanon, in India and in a couple of weeks we are in Türkiye bringing together women from different backgrounds. Many of them come from places where it’s challenging or not accepted in their society, they are resisting that. We provide a space for exchange and try to overcome these barriers and work together to achieve their dreams.

I’ve met many women with really difficult backgrounds, one of the first women we worked with was Khalida Popal. She’s from Afghanistan and played in the national team but had to flee with her family during the first invasion from the Taliban, where she experienced violence against her family and her friends. Finally, she arrived in Denmark as a refugee. We met her in Berlin and she shared her experiences and ideas. Now she has built up her own organizations over the years.

Many of these women are coming to us to learn from each other, get tools that they can take back and build their own things to make women more visible. A network is growing, there are opportunities and hope. We have to work together and that’s what I’m trying to do. I’m not doing this just to make women more visible because of my own joy. I do this because there are many who are voiceless and giving them a platform to tell their story, their struggles and what they are fighting for - you can give them a voice, a face and others experiencing the same, or even worse can see this and maybe achieve their dreams and overcome their challenges.

Of course, we are far away from a dream reality. There are many areas in the world where girls and women are shut inside, where they’re not able to go to school or play sports at all. In some areas, women’s freedoms have regressed. But we shouldn't stop now and get scared, there’s still a chance for a better future.

[ How do you prepare or even decide which locations to go to/focus your work? ]

Every second year we organize a football festival where we invite women from around the world to Berlin. We connect and network and come up with new ideas. One of our members with DISCOVER FOOTBALL moved to India, so we organized a festival in India. We’ve done the same in Lebanon and Türkiye as well.

I actually just came back from Istanbul - where we have a festival coming up. I won’t be able to join the first days because of my normal job, I’ll miss the fun part - playing football! But I went out now beforehand to get an idea of how the environment for women’s football is and get some footage - I can now work a little on social media in order to get everything ready for the tournament in a couple of weeks.

A lot of the time we time our projects around the European Championship or the World Cup so we can connect what we are doing to football in general. This usually helps with publicity as well.

Of course, it depends on who is funding us and what kind of message you’re trying to send or goal you’re trying to achieve. With Equal Playing Field, they had some crazy ideas like organizing the highest football match, the lowest match (by elevation) and the longest match to show that women can do anything. At DISCOVER FOOTBALL, the focus is more on empowering women to take their learnings back home and build up their own organizations, their own environment and help build a better future.

[ Are you/these organizations trying to partner with footballers or clubs and national teams? ]

Not at DISCOVER FOOTBALL - we are always dependent on funding. This is really a challenge - it would be nice to have a steady budget available, but we are always working from project to project. We need to become more futuristic and think ahead to how we can meet our funding goals.

Common Goal, on the other hand, started differently, previously one of their main funders was FIFA. The founder, Jürgen, a friend of mine always had a dream of taking just 1% from the huge bucket of money in football and using it for social empowerment and social causes. Now, the idea is everyone who pledges - footballers, organizations and companies working in football - spend 1% of their salary back to the community.

[ How do you balance your ‘real job’ with your photography work? ]

I’m working as a spokeswoman at a big IT company as my ‘real job’. It’s not the sexiest industry but I really like working in media relations and find this area of communication very interesting. It’s also helped me in my personal engagements - at DISCOVER FOOTBALL, for example, I’m not only producing footage, or photography and stories but also working with the media to share our message.

I’m saving my vacation days to go on these trips. Of course, sometimes it’s challenging since I also need ‘normal’ vacations as well! But my company has been supportive of me and my work as a photographer - they can see that I’m working on something that is very powerful. Sometimes, I’ve even managed to connect people, women with IT backgrounds fleeing their countries with jobs or connections to find one.

[ How can people best support your work and these causes? ]

Of course, if you have money, then donating is always a great way to support.

In general, there’s always a need for volunteers. Try to find organizations that are working in your area of expertise and see if you can help. Volunteer work is really key to many organizations, most wouldn’t be able to function with the help of volunteers.

At DISCOVER FOOTBALL, even though we are a permanent group, volunteer work from people who just believe in our cause and want to support our projects, is why we are able to run these projects. I do this because I want to see a better world for girls and women.

There are lots of ways to get involved, just look in the areas where you work and you’ll definitely find organizations you might be able to support - and we are happy for all the help we get!