For example, during the team’s training, Mohamed Salah is always smiling and laughing; he is the most cheerful person you can spot. El Hadary, on the other hand, is the most serious. He doesn’t joke around at all. – Ahmed Kadry, the official photographer of the Confederation of African Football who is responsible for covering the Africa Cup of Nations this year.
The photographs we see of the players of Egypt’s national football team are usually purely for documentation purposes. This deprives us of seeing them in a humane light and understanding who they are and what they’re going through. We’re only exposed to witnessing them celebrate or feel disappointed. But Ahmed Kadry, the official photographer hired by the Confederation of African Football to cover the Africa Cup of Nations of 2019 begs to differ.
Ahmed Kadry getting ready for his next shot.
“I’ve studied photography and I’ve been taking photographs for 13 years. I’ve also studied film making and directing at the Prague Film School,” he explained. Shooting and directing travel films is a vocation for Kadry. It’s the impactful and meaningful genre in which he merges his love for travel with his passion for creating films. His entry into the world of sports, however, is something recent. And his background brings an unusual but essential addition to the field.
Lipton and 7 Agency partnered up Egypt’s national football team during their journey to the 2018 FIFA World Cup. “They offered me the chance to accompany the team during their training camps. This was my first time. I hadn’t taken pictures related to football before but it was quite successful. It’s also a completely different experience than what I’m used to.”
Ahmed Kadry travelling with Egypt’s football team on their 2018 FIFA World Cup journey.
Kadry specializes in travel photography; a craft that strongly contrasts with football. In football, whether it’s a training camp or a match, the actions and reactions of each player are quite unpredictable. “Unlike travel photography, I don’t have a plan or a storyboard in mind. I don’t have time to take things in and scheme my shots. It’s quite challenging and the limitations it imposes on me as a photographer have pushed me beyond my boundaries.”
Players from the Egyptian national football team in one of Kadry’s impressive photographs.
According to Kadry, spending a lot of time with the Egyptian national football team’s players helped build a strong relationship of trust and intimacy between them. “For example, during the team’s training, Mohamed Salah is always smiling and laughing; he is the most cheerful person you can spot. El Hadary, on the other hand, is the most serious. He doesn’t joke around at all.”
“This relationship affects the quality of the photographs I capture,” he said proudly. “To my dismay, most photographs of our beloved players are for documentation purposes. Focusing only on documentation will inevitably produce shallow images. I want to artistically build on the character study I’ve developed of the different players to seize a deeper and richer image that expresses the range of emotions they experience during their most challenging moments,” he elaborated.
Follow Kadry’s coverage of the Africa Cup of Nations on his Instagram account here.
