Interview with Ferdinando Scianna, the Pope of photography

The 80th birthday of the great Sicilian photographer, writer and journalist. The impossible book on Sciascia, which he keeps in his drawer. And then friendship and smiles

You have turned eighty, you are Pope photography, Ferdinand Scianna, the writer, the journalist of the European, the brother-son of Leonardo Sciascia, the pupil of the art historian Cesare Brandi. Congratulations! You smile? “Always. A smile is the idea of ​​happiness”. And the happiness? “I imagine it as three pieces of wood held by a very poor girl in a shelter in Vietnam. Those are enough to play and happiness starts again, even in the most miserable place in the world”. Can you collect smiles? “They are photographs of people who love each other. Starting with those of our children. Over the years I have collected photos of my wife Paola and pasted them into an album, with my own hands. It was my little gift to her”.