ABSTRACT
Letizia battaglia began to photograph the Sicilian Mafia in 1974, long before it was popular, chic, convenient or particularly safe to do so. As the photography director of L'Ora, Palermo's left-wing daily newspaper, she or one of her assistants was present at the scene of every major crime in Palermo until shortly before the paper folded in 1990. Battaglia lives in the old historic district of Palermo—a desperately poor and largely abandoned section that encapsulates the best and worst of one of the most fascinating and beautiful cities in Europe. Her decision to live in the old center of Palermo is, like most things in Battaglia's life, a political decision. When battaglia started her photographic work, people regarded the Mafia as a purely criminal and local problem. Some even romanticized it. Anti-Mafia demonstrations in the 1970s were sparsely attended with most citizens closing their shutters in fear.
