In September of 2019, Cronin spent a month in Senegal at Thread Artist Residency thanks to the Josef and Anni Albers Foundation. There he focused solely on creating a body of work and finding ways to engage and connect with the community. Having the time and space to focus only on his work had a profound impact on him. He experimented with materials and incorporated objects from his surroundings into his work.

Not long after he returned home, the world faced Covid and once again, Cronin found himself in a position, due to the shutdown, to focus almost exclusively on his creative process and to look to his surroundings to find materials to work with. Along a stonewall fence on his property, Cronin unearthed a rotted-out oil tank that he and his family had once used as an outdoor fire pit, along with an old metal wagon. Cronin