The Journey

The Journey is a long term project, started on 2021, on the personal journey of residents of San Patrignano, an italian community for people with problems related to drug addiction.

According to the United Nations’ World drug report 2021, “drug use killed almost half a million people in 2019. In 2020, around 275 million people have used drugs, up by 22% from 2010.” The devastating effects of drug use have not been stemmed since last century to date.
San Patrignano is an Italian long-term drug recovery residential community, considered among the largest worldwide. 540 acres, more than 26,000 people hosted since 1978 and 4,000 years of prison converted in rehabilitation programs.
These photos are part of an ongoing project launched in 2021 on the educational and personal development of residents. I usually spend at least two days a month in the kennels, one of the activity areas of the community.
At every moment residents face their own limits, fears, frailties. Sometimes reality is so hard to face that it is necessary to exclude it from the visual field, to disconnect from the past for a while, trying to find the strength to restart. For the first year letters represent the only contact with the outside. There are often human relations to be, at least, understood. Sharing emotions is the key. The "senior" residents, nearing the end of their rehabilitative journey, try to help the "young" ones to recognize the mechanisms of addiction and get away from the cage of the negative habits.
It is a hard, deep and long fight with not predictable ending.