Two converging signs indicate "Exit" on the walls on the fish market in Trapani on the west coast of Sicily. July 2015

New development of council flats built in Porto Empedocle the very same site where the discharges of former mines lay untouched. Agrigento 2015

Pizzo Sella's abandoned residential development, better known as Michele Greco's Chirstmas Tree for it pyramidal shape, is the symbol of the Sack of Palermo, when former Mayor Salvo Lima and Mafia member and council assessor Vito Ciancimino unlawfully authorised about three thousand building licences in one night, destroying for good the Liberty heritage of Palermo's centre and outskirts.

A couple chats along while sun-bathing in front of a foreclosed hotel in Trapani periphery.

Muted buildings in Cinisi, the village near Palermo where Peppino Impastato was brutalised by the Badalamenti's hit men.

A wedding invitee enjoys a cigarette outside the church.

A window riddled with bullets in the heart of Palermo city centre. 90% of business activities in the Sicilian capital pay extorsion money to the mob, despite the increasing successful campaign of Addiopizzo which supports store owners to denounce the racket of extorsion in Palermo.

The wreath originally placed on rememberance of General Carlo Alberto Dall Chiesa lies uncared for and faced-down on the floor. Dalla Chiesa was murdered by Cosa nostra on September 3rd 1982 in the heart of the glamourous centre of Palermo.

Man outside his home in Palma di Montechiaro on the south coast of Sicily

A man is waiting for the bus at a vandalised bus top inb Palermo. March 2009

After years of neglet this strip on the south coast periphery of Palermo in Acqua dei Corsari, once used as an illegal dump for construction waste, was transformed in 2009 into a public park comprising of an open-air theatre, gardens and bicycle routes. The park never made it to the public though and due to unclear burocratic complications this €4Mln investment fell to abandonment.

Piles of uncollected refusals invade the carriage of a main road in Brancaccio district on the North-East periphery of Palermo.

Overview of a recent highway extension entangled within the North periphery of Palermo. September 2014

A fishmonger chats with a client at the historical street market of Capo in Palermo.

Valentina wearing a baroque mask at a friend's house.

A girl observes through her window in Cinisi, a village near Palermo, a demonstration in rememberance of anti-mafia activist and journalist Peppino Impastato killed by the Badalamenti mafia family on May 9th 1978.

Couple with dog at Vucciria market, Palermo.

Two teenagers pose in front of the camera. Palermo July 2015

An unauthorized parking attendant looks out for cars in search for a parking spot near Palermo's Central Station. September 2016

Stray dogs in Albergheria district in the historical centra of Palermo

A tourist shop in Palermo selling Brando's Godfather effimera. Palermo July 2009

A couple embraces in a passionate hug in the middle of a busy street in Palermo centre. 2015

A Costa Crociere cruising ship departs Palermo's harbour.

A woman appears in distress while praying in front of the statue of Saint Padre Pio near the Central Train Station in Palermo.

A stray dog stares at an empty street in Danisinni district. Palermo July 2009

A gate to nowhere on the hills overlooking Partinico, a village near palermo which is heavily controlled by the mob

"Terra Nostra" is a photo essay on the effects of Mafia in Sicily. With my photographs I have endevoured to document and capture the permanent scars inflicted by Cosa nostra on the Sicilian territory and the social context, victim and persecutor, of a system strongly rooted on fear and corruption. Born in Sicily myself, I started shooting Terra Nostra in 2009 and only now, after five years of work I finally found the project to be almost completed. The biggest challenged I had to face was to convey the legacy that Cosa nostra has imposed on the Sicilian people, the coasts permanently destroyed by illegal building speculation, the unsustainable economy resulted by a system based on extortion and corrupted public competitions of a broad capitalist monopoly of the crime families, and that sense of claustrophobic lack of freedom one can sense throughout the territory. A man standing on a vandalised bus stop in Palermo represents the haunted features of a degraded society.

The imposing structure of a foreclosed hotel overshadows a couple sun bathing in a polluted beach in Trapani, while the photograph of the girl wearing a mask suggests how complex and multilayered are social interactions in a place where the less you expose yourself the safer you’ll be. During this last five years I came to the realisation that the vague knowledge on the Mafia phenomenon, constructed by Hollywood imagery and stereotypes, has weirdly overpassed reality. This gap has trigger a common deception by stigmatising Sicily as a land where even tourist aren’t safe from the mob. Such creative yet unrealistic attitude has lead the real life Mafiosi to borrow back fragments of identity they lost along the way. Several bosses were found in their hiding places with copies of Coppola’s Godfather or Pacino’s memorabilia. To me Terra Nostra is an endeavour to focus back on the state of things in a place where decades of violence have marked permanently the territory, hoping that one day we’ll find again rightful ownership on our land.

Title: Terra Nostra

Exhibitions: Camera 16, Milano 2010 - The Strand Galleries 2012

Awards: Finalist, LensCulture Portrait Awards 2014 - Winner, Renaissance Photography Award 2012 - Shortlisted, Terry O’Neill Award 2012

Features & Publications: FT Weekend Magazine 2009 - Burn Magazine (online) 2009 - The Observer's Sean O'Hagan Review 2009 - Polka #16 Magazine 2012 - Fool #4 Magazine 2014 - CNN Photos August 2015