The Italian sculptor Salvatore Garau has “installed” one of his “sculptures” in front of Federal Hall, right at GW’s feet, and I have never found a better use for snarky air quotes than in this context. (Thanks to Jolene Howard for the heads up.) “Aphrodite Crying” is in a circle marked on the cobblestones at the corner of Wall and Broad.

I’m all for high concept but this one has got me. Still, the video is a lovely tribute to Fidi (despite the time lapse that has all the passersby jogging) and the buildings that surround the sculpture. And the more you think about it, the more you realize that he may be on to something: I am not sure I will ever pass this spot again and not think of Aphrodite. (This also happens to be the site where the city wants to relocate Charging Bull, the work of another Italian sculptor with a radical bent.)

There’s one flash of an image of a sculpture in the video, which I caught here as a still.

The press this week revolved around his sale of another sculpture of, well, nothing for $18,000. “It is a work that asks you to activate the power of the imagination,” Garau told the Spanish news outlet AS. “After all, don’t we shape a God we’ve never seen?”

The video has subtitles that have the occasional English translation:
“You don’t see me but I exist, right above this white round shape.
“I am Aphrodite, an intangible sculpture made of air and spirit.
“Still don’t see me? And yet I am here, in front of you.
And I cry because I am beauty and love which is disappearing.”