The River Clay Fine Arts Festival’s presenting sponsor is sending pallets of recycled post-industrial plastics into high school art rooms this fall. The finished work will be judged and awarded during festival weekend in downtown Decatur, October 24 and 25.
DECATUR, Ala. This fall, art teachers at high schools across North Alabama will receive something that has never come through their supply room door: a pallet of recycled post-industrial plastic materials. What their students make of it is entirely up to them.
The material comes from Plastic Recyclers Southeast, Inc. (PRSEI), the presenting sponsor of the River Clay Fine Arts Festival. This year, the Decatur company is launching “The Art of Recycling,” a unique student art competition that aligns with its goals: advocating for the arts in the community and encouraging creative recycling.
What ships to each school is post-industrial recycled plastic, not bottles or consumer packaging. It is the trim, scrap, and overrun that come off production lines at manufacturers with facilities in and around Morgan County; PRSEI collects, sorts, processes, and recycles these materials back into use across the industrial supply chain. Each participating high school receives a pallet of mixed plastic materials and can use any or all of it, including the packaging the materials arrive in. Anything unused can be recycled again, which is part of the lesson.
“I have spent more than 20 years around plastic that would be headed to a landfill if not collected and recycled,” said Grant McKelvey, president of PRSEI. “Plastics will be a new and challenging medium for these students. They won’t find this material at a craft store, and most of them may never use it in art projects again after this. For a few weeks, they get to work in something completely new to them. I’m sure the creativity of the kids will take plastics to a whole new art form.”
The competition carries a personal thread for McKelvey. His mother, Patti McKelvey, taught art at Austin High School in Decatur, and the competition is held in her honor.
“Art programs are usually one of the first things cut and the last things funded,” McKelvey said. “My mother spent a career making a lot out of a little in an art classroom in this city. Our goal is to put something in front of these students that they have never worked with before, and to put financial support into the programs that made it possible. The team at PRSEI is proud to support our community in a way that can inspire the next generation.”
Students will work in teams. Each finished piece must fit on a three-foot-by-five-foot board, and no other requirements apply. Judging takes place during festival weekend in downtown Decatur, where a PRSEI representative and River Clay Board President Holly Whitt will present the awards in person. Prize money goes directly to the winning school’s art program.
“River Clay exists to put art in front of people and resources behind the people who teach it,” Whitt said. “PRSEI could have written a check and stopped there. Instead, they are going into art rooms with a material nobody in the building has worked with before, and they are doing it in honor of a Decatur art teacher. That is the kind of partner you hope for.”
Since its founding, River Clay has invested more than $65,000 in arts education across North Alabama through classroom grants, student programming and community arts initiatives. In August, the festival opened its eleventh season by awarding $15,700 in classroom grants across 17 awards to teachers at Decatur City Schools, Morgan County Schools, Decatur Heritage Christian Academy, and Hartselle City Schools.
PRSEI is in the second year of a three-year presenting sponsorship, the first presenting sponsor in River Clay history.
River Clay returns to the grounds of Decatur City Hall on Saturday, October 24, and Sunday, October 25, 2026, with more than 75 juried artists from across the country, live music, food and family programming. The Rendezvous preview party opens the weekend on Friday evening, October 23, giving patrons the first look at the work before the festival opens to the public. Rendezvous tickets are $60 and include a weekend pass.
Participating schools include Priceville High School, Hartselle High School, Decatur Heritage Christian Academy, Decatur High School, and Austin High School. Festival details, patron packages and sponsorship information are available at riverclay.org.