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Cody Stuhltrager had all the requirements to be Eastern State Penitentiary’s first artist-in-residence: he had an established body of work, and had served time in prison.
“It’s really validating. I know all the work that I put in over the years,” said Stuhltrager, who served a 20-year prison sentence.
“It just feels really good to have that work acknowledged in such a big way, and to get such a cool opportunity to make art and to hopefully educate some people.”
He is the first of three artists who will spend a year working at Eastern State producing art and participating in exhibitions. Under the prison’s ReVision: Art and Justice program, the artists’ work seeks to expand how visitors experience contemporary art, history, and dialogue at the site. ReVision was created to spotlight justice-impacted artists.
Eastern State organized the Creative Catalyst Community, a group with backgrounds in art and justice to select the artist.
“I was asked to provide a lot of information, talk about my past work, my experience with incarceration, and provide examples of my work,” Stuhltrager said. “I gave a 10-minute artist talk at Eastern State as part of the interview.”
He said his “life went off the rails” and he “committed a violent crime to support my drug habit.”
He pleaded guilty to third degree murder, which is defined as “an unlawful killing that happens without premeditation or a specific intent to kill, but involves reckless behavior or a depraved indifference to human life.” Pennsylvania is one of only three states, along with Minnesota and Florida, to use this category of crime. He was arrested in 2001 and sentenced to 20 to 40 years in prison in 2003.
“I did not begin drawing and making greeting cards until a few months after I was arrested,” he said. “I demonstrated a proclivity for art-making at a young age, and I feel as though untapped creativity was always with me, but I failed to seriously apply myself until I was incarcerated.”
Stuhtrager, 45, grew up primarily in Bucks and Montgomery counties, although his elementary school years were spent at Ocean Gate, New Jersey.
“My family moved around a lot, an average of about one move every two years,” said Stuhltrager, 45.
From colored pencils to Mural Arts
In prison, he started drawing by using colored pencils to make greeting cards. He taught himself how to paint, and in 2013, he began participating in the Mural Arts Program of Philadelphia at Graterford Prison.
“They did teach us a lot through that program about making murals,” Stuhltrager said. “We would work on mural cloth, primarily in acrylics, and we would work on murals that would eventually be installed out in the city, a lot of which I worked on while I was in there that are still up in the city today.”
His first mural is at Russo Park in Northeast Philadelphia, at 7300 Torresdale Avenue, which he completed in 2024. According to the Mural Arts webpage, “Christa’s Mural” is a “restoration and redesign of a mural created in 1996 in memory of Christa Lewis, a St. Hubert’s student athlete whose life was tragically cut short. The work features Jake the Rottweiler, St. Hubert’s High School, and Christa’s Lyric, a poem by 1986 St. Hubert’s grad Karen ‘Angel’ Smyth.”
“My goal with that work was to fondly memorialize Christa, who was murdered in the park where the mural lives,” Stuhltrager said. “She went to school across the street. Family members still live in the area. She has not been forgotten by that community, and this mural was a way to help ensure that her memory continues to live on.”
Also in 2024, he created a temporary, winter holiday-themed “wing wall” mural outside Lincoln Financial Field.
“I was contracted by the Philadelphia Eagles marketing team, and the mural was up for about a month, as the team moved from the regular season into the playoffs. Additionally, I will be installing another Mural Arts project I co-designed and painted with muralist Eric Okdeh. The mural, an exploration of mentorship, is called ‘Circle Up’ and will be installed on the side of the Comhar Open Door Clubhouse in the Kensington neighborhood.”
ReVision: Art and Justice
Under Eastern State’s ReVision: Art and Justice program, Stuhltrager is proposing a two-part installation that’s expected to be completed in November.
“One will attempt to describe the scale of mass incarceration via a mural map of sites of captivity in the US,” he said. “The other will present the micro-perspective, in the form of a collection of common, everyday items produced by prison labor. The two works will complement each other in an examination of the scale, history, economics, and human consequences of prison labor in the United States.”
He said work done in prison is a complicated thing.
“We want people to learn skills and better themselves and better prepare themselves for when they are eventually released from prison. It’s also exploitive. It’s prison labor. It props up these institutions. It is the way that they operate, and it’s a complicated issue. I just want to explore, dive into a little bit and get some conversations going around it.”
“ReVision creates opportunities for artists with lived experience to shape the way we understand justice, humanity, and transformation,” said Dr. Kerry Sautner, President & CEO of Eastern State, in a statement. “Cody’s extraordinary artistic journey and commitment to community make him an ideal inaugural artist for this residency. His work reflects the power of creativity to inspire dialogue, challenge assumptions, and deepen public understanding of incarceration.”
Since he was paroled in 2021, Stuhltrager supported himself via artwork including “a mix of my own projects, contract work with Mural Arts, and assisting other artists in the manufacture and installation of their works.”
Readjusting to life on the outside in Philly has been hard.
“Think about from 2001 to 2021, how different the world is and most notably technology. I would say I never had a cell phone before. It was a lot to get used to and I think I’m almost there now, but I mean, I’m now what, almost five years removed from prison and I’m still struggling a little bit.”
