![Instituto Mental - Tino Soriano](https://fiebrephotobook.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/cubierta-Insituto-Mental-902x1200.jpg)
Instituto Mental
Tino Soriano
OJOS DE BUEY
Built in 1889, the Santa Creu Mental Institute treated Barcelona's mentally ill for a century. The colossal building on the outskirts of the city had a capacity for 700 people. In its final years it housed only about 40 patients, most of them elderly people who had never left the facility.
In his first report as a photographer in 1980, Tino Soriano managed to sneak in, taking advantage of the absence of medical staff on Saturdays. Far from the preconceived ideas and prejudices he might have had about mental illness, he found a group of harmless, kind, lonely people abandoned by their families. They lived in dire conditions and feared the outside world.
This report marked the beginning of Tino Soriano's extensive career dedicated to portraying the human facets of the world of healthcare.