30When Harry Met...
Boris Becker
The German tennis legend is great fun to photograph
and doesn’t take himself seriously, says Harry Borden
Having a whole day to shoot meant Harry had a wide variety of images to give The Sunday Times Magazine’s designerALL PICTURES © HARRY BORDEN
I
love watching and
playing tennis, so in
2015, I was excited
by the prospect of
meeting and photographing
one of the sport’s most famous
champions, Boris Becker. As
tennis fans will know, Boris
was just 17 when he won his
fi rst Wimbledon title and
became the youngest-ever
Grand Slam champion. He
went on to win fi ve more
Grand Slam titles along with
numerous other honours.
Since retiring in 1999, he
has at various times been
a businessman, television
tennis pundit and successful
poker player, as well as coach
to fellow Wimbledon champion
Novak Djokovic for three
seasons. He’s also had a
turbulent private life, which
has often been highlighted
in the media.
In June 2015, he was about
to publish his book Boris
Becker’s Wimbledon, and The
Sunday Times Magazine was
publishing an interview withhim by journalist Lynn Barber.
I was commissioned to shoot
the pictures that would go
with the text.
There was some budget for
a stylist and I was off ered the
services of Deborah Latouche,
who’s well known for her work in
the industry. Often, a stylist will
turn up for a shoot with clothes
that don’t quite fi t and need to be
pegged behind the subject’s
back before they look good, but
Deborah did a great job and
was very attentive to detail.
A few days before the shoot,
I asked her to source some
vintage Oliver Goldsmith
sunglasses, which were a bit
avant-garde in design and
had frames shaped like tennis
racquets. I’m not sure where
I’d got the idea for using them,
but I thought they would makesome fun pictures, rather than
simply asking him to wear
some boringly ‘good taste’
clothes. Deborah came up
trumps and managed to
arrange a loan of these
sunglasses for the shoot. I also
brought along some tennis
balls with the aim of getting
him to do something with
them in the portraits.
We met at a studio called
The Works in Turnham Green,
south west London, where
I’d worked several times
previously. Becker was just 48
at the time, but I was shocked
to see his physical condition
when he arrived. He was like
a shambling old man. The
previous year he’d had a double
hip replacement and still
wasn’t moving well. He was
also limping from an old ankle
injury from his playing years.
From the outset, I realised he
was going to be a good portrait
subject. He was really funny,
very intelligent and good
company. He was always joking
around, and did exactly what‘From the outset
I realised he was
going to be a good
portrait subject’