There is a chair floating in the clouds above the skies of Rome.
Someone engraved a special word to remind us we are still human.
She wrote it with a small white chalk, and then let it go.

This is a photographic work shot in the east side of Rome about ordinary people and their daily-life stories, turned out into extraordinary ones by such an uncertain city.

There is a small though significant detail you should keep in mind: all these stories have a thing in common – they do share a dream. The dream of a different city, where the concept of “community” becomes relevant through effort and mutual participation. Stories of value that arise from a utopian dream, because being human is always a choice.

A mosaic made of faces, details, metaphors, a journey through a silent but still visible resistance.

You will be invited to the night tango lessons where the elderlies are dancing until late because “tango gives us the strength to carry on in these very dark times”. You will meet the horses saved from the slaughterhouse by Sonia, a rare and kind soul. You will enter a popular gym in a crime-ridden neighborhood where boxing has become an opportunity for the youngest athletes to rise from hell. And then you will meet the volunteers of Nonna Roma association, who fight every single day to support whoever is in need.

“Utopia” (also known as “Il gioco dei timidi”) is a photographic project developed for Leica Camera Italia and Contrasto Agency and is part of the Leica Roma Chilometro Zero project.