You are invited to an HAD Faculty Conversations by Caterina Pierre, “Trust in the Soul: Attilio Piccirilli’s Fragilina (1923) and the Beginnings of Modernism in American Figurative Sculpture.”
Date: Wednesday, September 17th, 2025
Time: 12:00 – 1:00 pm
Venue: Main 210
About the Speaker: Caterina Y. Pierre, PhD, has taught at Pratt since 2008. She received her doctorate from the CUNY Graduate Center in 2005 where her specialty was nineteenth century sculpture. Her book Genius Has No Sex: The Sculpture of Marcello (1836-1879) was published by Editions de Penthes/Editions Infolio, in 2010. Caterina’s book Redefining the Hero in Tomb Sculpture, 1871-1901: Monument as Memory in France, Italy and the United States is forthcoming from Routledge. Since 2015, Caterina has taught and published on art crime, and her article “The Durig Scrapbook: Notes on the Silent Forger,” was published in the Journal of Art Crime (Spring 2022).
About the Project: Attilio Piccirilli’s Fragilina (1923, Metropolitan Museum of Art) will be analyzed in connection with an earlier sculpture by the artist entitled A Soul (1909, unlocated), a work that is stylistically and thematically connected to earlier nineteenth century Italian Purismo sculpture. Fragilina is a key sculpture in Piccirilli’s oeuvre, in that it marks a shift from his earlier figures to more Symbolist and abstract forms found in the work of his direct contemporaries. The title “Fragilina” references the negative experiences of Italian American immigrants in the United States, and the sculpture also attempts to bring the form into a new stylistic range.
Please RSVP with this link.
* This event is for Pratt community.