Patricia Cronin, Aphrodite, and the Lure of Antiquity
"Patricia Cronin, Aphrodite, and the Lure of Antiquity" is the companion volume to the Tampa Museum of Art's exhibition series "Conversations with the Collection." Launched in 2018, this series explores the synergy between collections that may initially strike visitors as wholly separate from one another - namely, classical antiquities and modern and contemporary art. Patricia Cronin (American, b. 1963) is an internationally recognized Brooklyn-based artist uniquely positioned for such a visual conversation. Winner of a Rome Prize in Visual Art in 2006-2007, and past Trustee of the American Academy in Rome, Cronin is deeply interested in the ancient world, which she frequently references in her work. For the first commission in this series, Cronin created a large outdoor sculpture of Aphrodite inspired by a 1st century AD marble torso of Aphrodite in the Tampa Museum of Art's antiquities collection. Entitled "Aphrodite Reimagined," Cronin's sculpture re-envisions the Museum's Aphrodite fragment as a monumental "complete" sculpture with a stone torso and translucent head, arms, and legs. The sculpture invites viewers to reconsider the narrative of an ancient work heavily restored after its rediscovery, and acts as a metaphor for shifting certainties about human history. The publication "Patricia Cronin, Aphrodite, and the Lure of Antiquity" presents new scholarship on the Tampa Aphrodite and Cronin's practice by the exhibition's curator, Dr. Seth D. Pevnick, former Chief Curator and Richard E. Perry Curator of Greek and Roman Art, as well as an in-depth interview between the artist and Joanna Robotham, Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art.