©Franco Zecchin

This morning on BBC World there was a report about the latest round up of the drug cartel mafia in Naples, Italy. More than 200 hundred arrests, predominantly from two clans…. (Why is it stories of the Mafia are always so interesting, so watchable..? I blame Francis myself).

Watching the BBC report made me think of Franco Zecchin, a photographer famous for his long term project, along with photographer Letizia Battaglia, on mafia, mafia trials, and murders. Great work, important, and dangerous to shoot (if you excuse the pun). I know you can buy it as a Photo Poche book, ‘Chroniques Siciliennes’. It’s worth having in your book collection. To see a lot of images from the series click here.

Palermo, November 15, 1983.
Benedetto Grado’s wife and daughters at the scene of his slaying.
The family was already mourning his son Antonio.©Franco Zecchin

I met Zecchin once in Bucharest, photographing a demonstration in the city centre in the summer of 1990. I was young and naive, (now I’m just naive), and I asked him what it was like working for Magnum, and he replied “hard work”. That was the extent of my chat with him. He left Magnum after 3 years. More recently Zecchin has brought out a book on nomads of the world, and a Sicilian recipe cook book.

I just found this link which seems to have masses of Zecchin’s work, and which I look forward to pouring through….cheers.