Until 2 October at Galería Nueva in Madrid (Doctor Fourquet 10), the Ecuadorian artist and photographer Felipe Jácome presents his project Caminantes for the first time in Spain.
The project, which is currently on a European tour, will arrive in Madrid, with the support of the Embassy of Ecuador in Spain, directly from Paris, where it has been exhibited in Paris Photo 2019, to return again to the French capital in November, to the rooms of the Embassy of Ecuador.
Caminantes is a project that arose from Felipe Jácome’s experience in Venezuela as a photographer. In 2018, the photographer was documenting the arrival of Venezuelan migrants in Ecuador, when a little girl handed him a 100 bolivar note folded like an origami heart. Understanding that a girl was playing with a banknote because it no longer has value made him ask a series of questions: what has happened to make this money worthless and, more importantly, what are the consequences on people’s lives? This origami figure became a clue to begin to understand the cause and magnitude of the crisis: money in Venezuela is no longer worth anything and people can no longer survive.
Months later, Jácome set out with a group of Venezuelans leaving their country to document their exodus. Along the way, the artist encountered thousands of people walking along the road, their faces full of sorrow, nostalgia and fear at the uncertainty of their lives. In the mountains and villages they pass through, these people are known as “the walkers”, hence the name of the series.
