Italy has been, and remains, a dream destination for many tourists. Travellers to the country enjoy its cultural history, beaches, climate, and wonderful food, but if one looks behind the beautiful backdrop of the historical old cities and magnificent landscapes, one often encounters the other side of Italy: citizens’ dissatisfaction with their own country, poverty, chaos, environmental pollution, the mafia, and violence, as well as a corrupt, decadent political system. In his journeys from the south to the north of the country, the photographer Christian Jungeblodt (*1962), who lived in Italy for a long time himself, makes the closeness of beauty and ugliness, luster and squalor, grandeur and the abyss visible. Essays by renowned authors like Petra Reski and John Hooper accompany this photo book with its wealth of colour photographs and black-and-white smartphone photos. Text in English and Italian.