Mourning I
"Luto I"

The skies weep, the sea howls.
Dreams die overseas.
The waves seal their tomb.
Europe loses its nails.

Lloran los cielos, aúlla el mar.
Mueren los sueños en ultramar.
Las olas sellan su tumba.
Europa pierde las uñas.

Dimensions with frame: 29"H x 17"W x 3"D (73.5cm H x 43cm W x 7.5cm D)

Dimensions without frame: 12"H x 5.5"W x 3"D (30.5cm H x 14cm W x 7.5cm D)

Materials: Clay, glaze, acrylics, wood, spray paint

Year: 2026

Price: Upon request

Giving back: 10% of my net proceeds from this piece will be donated to a nonprofit aligned with the social issue behind the work: Open Arms

The Truth Behind:

— This Piece —
Mourning I is part of The Unnamed, a series of sculptures confronting the human cost of the Mediterranean migration crisis, the individual lives, the unnamed bodies, the unfinished dreams, and the silence that follows.

The sculpture is a personification of the Mediterranean Sea itself, imagined through the mourning traditions of Andalusia, in southern Spain. For centuries, the black mantilla has symbolized grief, devotion, and remembrance, transforming sorrow into a visible and dignified act. The black mantilla was worn during funerary rituals; the black veil transforms sorrow into something visible, carried publicly and with dignity.

The female figure embodies the Mediterranean as a grieving mother carrying within her waters thousands of lives lost while attempting to cross from one shore to another. She mourns those who were never recovered, those who were never identified, and those whose families were left without answers.

Clothed in black, she becomes the Andalusian Mediterranean: a sea that remembers every life entrusted to it and every dream that never reached land.

Mourning I, together with Mourning II, its counterpart inspired by Moroccan traditions of mourning expressed through white, the work forms a dialogue across the Mediterranean: two shores, two cultures, two languages of grief, and one sea carrying the memory of those it could not return.

— The Social Issue —
The Mediterranean Sea has always been a path of crossing. For centuries, it connected civilizations, cultures, and peoples. But for decades now, long before the cameras arrived, long before the statistics began, it has also been a cemetery.

Since 2014, the International Organization for Migration has recorded more than 72,000 deaths and disappearances on migration routes worldwide. But the dying did not begin in 2014. That is simply when the world began counting. Many shipwrecks happen with no survivors. Many bodies are never recovered. Many deaths simply go unrecorded, as they always have. The number is a minimum estimate of a reality that is, in truth, uncountable.

Why do people cross?

Migration across the Mediterranean is rarely a choice made lightly. People leave because of war, political persecution, economic collapse, and increasingly, climate-driven displacement, drought, land degradation, and environmental crisis that make entire regions uninhabitable. The journey is not a single crossing. It is a long, multi-stage process through multiple countries, often spanning months or years, moving through informal settlements and detention facilities.

How do they cross?

Most migrants rely on smuggling networks, not centralized criminal organizations, but fragmented systems of local and regional facilitators who coordinate transport and charge big amounts of money. These networks expand precisely when legal migration pathways are closed. The sea crossing itself is the most dangerous phase: overcrowded boats, no safety equipment, unreliable engines, and no guarantee of rescue. Survival depends on weather, distance, and chance.

What does Europe do?

The European Union has implemented a border externalization strategy that shifts migration management to third countries, primarily by funding and equipping the Libyan Coast Guard to intercept vessels before they reach European territory, as documented by Amnesty International. These operations result in the forced return of individuals to detention centers in Libya, where Human Rights Watch and UN agencies have reported crimes against humanity, including torture and slavery. Simultaneously, the imposition of legal and administrative restrictions on humanitarian rescue organizations, combined with the lack of safe and legal pathways, has turned the Mediterranean into a high-mortality route. According to the International Organization for Migration (IOM), these deaths are a predictable consequence of current EU migration policies and the ongoing criminalization of solidarity.