A contemporary installation and performance artist, in his practice, Martiel critically engages themes of censorship, oppression, immigration, and racism in modern society, often by putting his own body in pain-inducing or vulnerable situations. Martiel’s body is his artwork.

In Jungle, Martiel will be lying naked on a large table, surrounded by tropical fruits of Latin America, the Caribbean and Africa imported to the United States. Spectators are invited to eat the fruit until there is nothing left, a metaphorical mirroring of the way Black bodies, and African, Latin American, and Black American culture is consumed and absorbed in modern U.S. cultural, political, and social contexts.