Bruce Grobbelaar — Editorial Photography for 11 Freunde

This commission came from 11 Freunde, the German football magazine known for treating the game as cultural subject rather than match coverage. The brief was straightforward: a character-led portrait to accompany a long-form written feature.

Grobbelaar's career — thirteen years as goalkeeper at Liverpool FC, international appearances for Zimbabwe, coaching stints across North America and Southern Africa — brings its own gravity into the room. The approach was to leave it there rather than direct it. Light and framing were kept simple. Direction was minimal. Conversations moved between football, travel, and memory while the camera waited for something unguarded.

The selected frame catches him looking off-camera, mid-thought. That slight detachment is what gives the image its tone — observational rather than constructed.

Working from Manchester, commissions like this sit naturally alongside local commercial work. The subject changes; the approach doesn't.