Patricia Cronin is our Studio Sunday artist this week! Cronin is known for her two and three-dimensional works in a range of media, many of which explore issues of gender and marriage equality.

While Cronin is known for works in sculpture and installation, in the above photo she’s hard at work in another one of her favourite media – paint. It looks as though the artist is working with delicate washes of paint here, building up layers between the background and foreground on the painting of a female figure that’s laid out on the table. This process and the works seen on the wall behind Cronin make me think of Ida Applebroog’s studio, and the way that artist tends to work.

Judging from the detailed figuration of the painting Cronin is pictured working on, it seems like the hanging works behind her might just be background paintings or underpaintings that will later be covered over with realistic detail. There’s a studious sense to Cronin’s studio, and it’s interesting to see the artist working on a flat surface – likely a necessity of the thin paper that she was using at the time.

Numerous brushes and paint buckets are laid out on the tables almost like surgical implements. I can imagine Cronin standing here working, reaching periodically for one of the carefully laid-out brushes without evening needing to look up.

Cronin has been based in New York for most of her artistic career, and has spent time as an educator at both Columbia and Yale universities. 

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