Fabio Mantovani's 'Cento case popolari' documents Italy's public housing megastructures

Fabio Mantovani's photobook 'Cento case popolari' (Quodlibet, 2017) captures intimate, non-judgmental views inside ten major Italian public housing complexes built between the 1950s and 1980s, including Forte Quezzi in Genoa, Le Vele di Scampia, Gallaratese in Milan, ZEN in Palermo, and Corviale in Rome. Rather than panoramic exteriors, Mantovani shoots from within, framing everyday life against the monumental architecture. The book includes an introductory essay by Sara Marini and a postface by Piero Orlandi, who describes the project as a journey building a specific Italian landscape of second-half-20th-century public architecture. The work is part of a broader renewed interest in this architectural heritage, which once embodied utopian visions of collective living but later became synonymous with social problems.