This bronze sculpture is the 2/3rds to scale version of the original three-ton Carrara marble, "Memorial To A Marriage" (2002), the first and only Marriage Equality monument in the world.

This bronze sculpture is the maquette of the original three-ton Carrara marble sculpture, "Memorial To A Marriage" (2002), the first and only Marriage Equality monument in the world.

Designed as mortuary sculpture of Cronin and her (now) wife, artist Deborah Kass, Cronin sculpted this before gay marriage was legal anywhere in the United States. To simulate a few of the rights heterosexual marriage affords, same-sex couples could only acquire legal documents about the end of their lives, such as wills, health care proxies and powers of attorney documents. She employed the American Neoclassical sculpture form to address a federal failure of prohibiting same sex couples to wed. The challenge of this work, as always, was to strike a balance between a high level of sophisticated, formal execution and pointed political protest.

Cronin purchased their burial plot in Woodlawn Cemetery, Bronx, NY, designed as America’s Père Lachaise, and permanently installed the marble sculpture on their future final resting place. By buying her own land Cronin also addressed the scarcity of real women (as opposed to allegorical female forms) honored in public monuments in New York City.

Bronze versions like this one, are in the permanent collection of Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery, Washington, DC, The Fuhrman Family Foundation, New York, NY, Perez Art Museum Miami, Miami, and Kelvingrove Art Museum and Gallery, Glasgow, Scotland.

Courtesy of Patricia Cronin