The Refrigerated Ship “Antoinette Castro” (1969-1980)

The Joaquín Amigó Art Room at the Real Casino of Tenerife is currently hosting an exhibition called “Revelations,” which creates a symbiosis between the work of the Tenerife photographer Antoinette Castro Domínguez and the painter Iván Surikov “Waña”.

The proposal establishes a dialogue between photography and painting around identity, memory, the passage of time, and the search for harmony, and will feature poetry and music interventions during its inauguration.

The Tenerife photographer Antoinette Castro Domínguez, internationally awarded and with a career that includes publications and exhibitions abroad, presents in this show a selection from her series “Beneath the Fragile” and “Unfolding the View.” Her work stems from a biographical approach and uses the human body and landscape as elements to explore the relationship between identity, memory, and the environment.

Antoinette Castro Domínguez is one of the four children of the Tenerife businessman and shipowner Florentín Castro and his wife Guadalupe Domínguez. At this point, we must remember that one of the ships that was part of the Castro London Ltd. fleet bore the name “Antoinette Castro,” which was part of a second-hand lot acquired in Germany from the famous Horn Line: “Lupita Castro,” “María Castro,” and “Tinito Castro.”

Construction number 455 from the J.J. Sietas shipyard in Neuenfelde, launched on August 8, 1959, under the name “Irmgard Horn” and commissioned on October 10, 1959, in 1969 it became part of the Castro London Ltd. fleet, renamed “Antoinette Castro,” and until 1971 belonged to the aforementioned German company, whose flag it flew.

Flagged in Liberia and registered under the name of Albion Transport Corporation —one of the companies in Florentín Castro's shipping conglomerate— in 1980 it was resold to Mercury Corp., being flagged in Panama under the name “African Violet.” Abandoned in the port of Las Palmas, on October 8, 1983, it was scuttled and sunk in nearby waters and has since rested on the seabed of Gran Canaria.

With a gross tonnage of 826 tons and a deadweight of 853 tons, it measured 63.20 m in overall length —55.90 m between perpendiculars— and 9.20 m in beam. It was a Type 10 refrigerated ship powered by a diesel engine that allowed it to maintain a speed of 11.5 knots. IMO 5163431.

Photo: canopus (shipspotting.com)