MANTERO

“Mantero” is a name given in several European countries to some street vendors who use cloth blankets to display their merchandise on the ground and which, in turn, allows them to quickly collect their products in the event of a police raid in areas where this type of sales is prohibited. The majority of these people are African or Asian migrants who come to these countries in search of new opportunities for their lives and those of their families. They cross thousands of kilometers and in many cases, cross the Mediterranean Sea, putting their lives in danger in order to achieve that desired well-being.

In this installation, these cloth blankets are replaced by thermal blankets, the same ones used by rescuers who, in a titanic task, sail through the waves and inclement weather with the purpose of saving those lives that violence, inequality and many governments have been forgetting and leaving them adrift to a fate that is often disastrous. The thermal blankets, which are used to shelter bodies exposed to hours or days of cold sea, take the place of the others that serve for subsistence and that here, in front of the Mediterranean Sea, they confront the odyssey of what they experienced and what they now have to live on.