Dino

This is the story of Bernardino De Sanctis, my father.

He ran away from school when he was still very young and decided, despite everyone’s objections, to commit himself to becoming a mechanic, the only thing that made his heart leap. He devoted his whole life to this

passion. In 1966, he opened his own mechanic workshop and when he got the economic independence, sufficient to support a family, he married Assunta De Sanctis, the woman who has given him three daughters. Dino hoped that the third pregnancy was a male to share his passion with but fate decided another female was born.

Me.

All my life I have been surrounded by cars, old iron, steering wheels, wrenches...

Throughout my childhood and adolescence I had never understood why my father spent so many hours far away from his family and why he brought so much old iron into our house and garden. I still remember the smell of the grease on his skin when he returned at night for dinner after a long day spent in his workshop.

His hands, so big and dirty, scared me.

I started this project because I needed to get close to my father and to be able to understand who I am and where I come from.