Angelo Ferracuti's book 'Non ci resta che l'amore' chronicles photographer Mario Dondero's life

The book 'Non ci resta che l'amore. Il romanzo di Mario Dondero', published by il Saggiatore in 2021, is a biography of the renowned Italian photographer Mario Dondero (born Milan 1928, died Petritoli 2015). Written by Angelo Ferracuti, it intertwines three timelines: Dondero's early life (Milan, Genoa, WWII partisan in Val d'Ossola, Paris from 1954, Rome in the 1960s), recent travels with Ferracuti (Monfalcone, Alba, Cartoceto), and Ferracuti's 2020 journey across Italy during COVID to interview those who knew Dondero, including photographers Uliano Lucas and Gianni Berengo Gardin, writer Raffaele La Capria, and printer Claudio Bassi. The book highlights Dondero's friendships at Bar Jamaica in Milan (with Ugo Mulas, Luciano Bianciardi) and his encounters with artists like Arturo Schwartz, Piero Manzoni, Castellani, Bonalumi, and filmmakers like Pasolini (on sets of 'La ricotta' and 'Comizi d'amore'). Dondero's photography, influenced by Robert Capa, Cartier-Bresson, and Doisneau, rejected aestheticism for social realism, capturing the everyday epic. Ferracuti, initially a fiction writer, shifted to reportage after meeting Dondero.