My art research is preoccupied by human error. An action or series of actions leading to something that was not intended. I think a lot about our impending doom, how fragile existence is, and what the future looks like with or without us.
When You’re Done Dying, is an installation of a store front awning, blade sign, and parking lot sign marking the exterior of an abandoned business. The awning has no cover and marks no entrance as it hangs on the gallery wall. The blade and parking lot signs appear to have been affected by indiscernible forces, the latter pulled from the ground, the former frozen in mid-manipulation. Each of these elements light up, advertising nothing. The cool light emits from the signage frames and fills the gallery space as viewers experience and move through the work.
Individual elements of the installation are made of cheap building materials found at DIY mega stores; not what actual store signage is made from. Plywood, paint, and foam mimic steel and concrete.
Cody Arnall is an Associate Professor of Sculpture at Texas Tech University. Through material selection and manipulation, his work addresses human intervention in environments and impending doom.
Some of Arnall’s recent exhibitions are those at the University of Notre Dame, South Bend, IN; Bloomsburg University of Pennsylvania, Bloomsburg, PA; Contemporary Art Museum Plainview, Plainview, TX; Southeast Missouri State University, Cape Girardeau, MO; Axis Gallery, Sacramento, CA; K Space Contemporary, Corpus Christi, TX; CICA Museum, Gimpo, SKR; Site:Brooklyn, Brooklyn, NY; Barrister’s Gallery, New Orleans, LA; Durango Arts Center, Durango, CO; Pump Project, Austin, TX; Terminal 136, San Antonio, TX; Herron School of Art and Design, Indianapolis, IN; Brigham Young University, Provo, UT. He has also participated in residencies at Sculpture Space in Utica, NY and at Vermont Studio Center in Johnson, VT.
Arnall received a BFA from Oklahoma State University and an MFA from Louisiana State University. Prior to his appointment at TTU, Arnall spent two years as a Full-Time Instructor at the Paducah School of Art & Design in Paducah, KY. He is also a founding member of the artist-run gallery and studio space, CO-OPt in Lubbock, TX.
Website:www.codyarnall.com
Instagram:@cody_arnall