DECATUR- Record applicant pool yields more than 70 juried artists from 16 states, with live demonstrations across the weekend and a festival T-shirt inspired by a sculptor’s work
The River Clay Fine Arts Festival announced on September 1st, 2026, the juried artist lineup for its eleventh year. More than seventy artists were selected from 167 applications, the largest pool in the festival’s history, and they are coming to downtown Decatur from 16 states on Saturday and Sunday, October 24 and 25.
Close to 40 percent of this year’s artists have never shown at River Clay before. 27 are new to the festival, showing how far the event’s reputation has traveled in eleven years. At the same time, 11 of last year’s 16 award winners are coming back, which says something about what it feels like to work this weekend once you have done it.
Selection is competitive and blind. A panel of jurors reviews submitted work without artist names attached, scoring on craftsmanship, originality, and body of work. Roughly half of the artists who applied this year did not make the cut.
“People ask us every year what makes River Clay different, and the honest answer is the artists,” said Holly Whitt, Board President, River Clay Fine Arts Festival. “We are a fine arts festival, and this is a fine arts lineup featuring some of our region’s best. When you walk the festival grounds in October, you are looking at work that a jury fought over; that is what brings people back.”
The mix spans every category the jury accepts. Painting and mixed media are the deepest fields this year, with jewelry close behind and strong showings in ceramics, glass, photography, and wood. Sculpture, fiber, metalwork, and drawing round out the roster. The full lineup, searchable by medium, is live now at riverclay.org.
About half the artists are based in Alabama, several of them in Decatur. The rest are putting in serious miles. There are artists loading vans this fall in the California desert, in Michigan, in Buffalo, and in Connecticut, and pointing them toward a river town of 57,000 people. Nobody drives that far for a weekend that does not deliver. Eleven years of patrons turning out and buying work has given River Clay a reputation that travels.
Two artists working live, in front of you
River Clay has named two demonstrating artists for 2026. Both will be working in the open across the weekend rather than simply showing finished pieces, and both are happy to be interrupted with questions.
Jamey Grimes
Tuscaloosa, Alabama | Friday evening and Saturday
Grimes builds large-scale sculptural installations out of corrugated plastic, shaping a synthetic material into forms that read like cloud, water, or cellular tissue. He is an assistant professor of art at the University of Alabama, and his work is on permanent display at the Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts and Fairmont Chicago Millennium Park, among others. He will be working Friday evening during the Rendezvous preview party and again on Saturday.
Chandler Hayes
Huntsville, Alabama | Sunday
Hayes works in spray paint, taking a piece from blank surface to finished image in a matter of minutes while a crowd watches it resolve. His murals appear on the Alabama Mural Trail. He will demonstrate on Sunday, the festival’s closing day.
Organizers also confirmed that the 2026 official festival T-shirt will be inspired by Grimes’ sculptural work, carrying an interpretation of the layered, plastic forms he is known for. The design will be revealed closer to the festival, and quantities will be limited to what sells on site.
The weekend opens Friday evening, October 23, with the Rendezvous, a ticketed preview party that gives guests first access to the artists and their work before the gates open to the public. Rendezvous tickets are $60 and include a weekend pass. The festival itself runs Saturday and Sunday, October 24 and 25, in downtown Decatur. General admission is $5 and covers both days.
Beyond the weekend, River Clay has reinvested $65,000 in arts education across the region, including teacher mini-grants awarded this August across four school districts. The festival is presented by Plastics Recyclers Southeast, Inc.
Media Release/Emma Martin/Decatur Tourism
