Artist Talk: Cody Norman

Join us for an artist talk by Cody Norman (CAA MFA 3D Design '20) followed by a conversation with Andrew Satake Blauvelt, Director of Cranbrook Art Museum.

Cody Norman (b. 1992) is a Chicago-based artist, designer, and educator. He currently serves as part-time faculty in the Sculpture and Designed Objects departments at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. He graduated with a BFA from SAIC in 2016 and earned an MFA in 3D Design from Cranbrook Academy of Art in 2020. Norman works with both digital and analog fabrication processes to transform recycled and bio plastics into functional art objects. Creating enigmatic forms that feel at once familiar and foreign, Norman’s process physically blurs the line between digital and hand craft.

Norman’s forms are inspired by biomimicry and sustainability. He designs, builds, and creatively misuses his own tools, such as the handheld plastic extrusion gun, which melts recycled plastic into improvisational organic forms. Norman uses a KUKA industrial robot, formerly a tool of mass production, to create one of a kind objects in unique ways. His objects resemble nature but have a chaotic and unpredictable materiality, as well as an element of function alluding to the “usefulness” of plastic objects.

Norman’s work is represented by I.M. Weiss Gallery and his Trace Chair has recently been acquired by the Cranbrook Art Museum where it is currently on view in the exhibition Labyrinth / Laboratory: Selections from the Cranbrook Collection. His work has shown at the Edsel & Eleanor Ford House, Chicago Botanic Garden, Walker Art Center, and Interior Design Show (IDS) - Toronto.

He recently installed his first permanent outdoor public sculpture in downtown Oak Park, Illinois. In addition to his solo studio practice, Norman is a freelance fabricator and consultant for large-scale 3D printing, recycling, and robotic fabrication. He is a co-founder of Redemptive Plastics and frequently collaborates with Alt_ Chicago for design and fabrication projects.

UN SUSTAINABILITY GOALS

We use Detroit's UNESCO City of Design designation as a call to action for Detroiters to embrace the Sustainable Development Goals in their own communities, contributing to the active effort of solving global interconnected issues.