QuickCure Clay

My Artwork Illustrates a Chemical Review on Frontal Polymerization!

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“Frontal Polymerizations: From Chemical Perspectives to Macroscopic Properties and Applications” by Benjamin A. Suslick, Julie Hemmer, Brecklyn R. Groce, Katherine J. Stawiasz, Philippe H. Geubelle, Giulio Malucelli, Alberto Mariani, Jeffrey S. Moore, John A. Pojman, and Nancy R. Sottos, published by American Chemical Society (ACS) Publications on February 24, 2023, is a 62-page chemical review. My QuickCure Clay sculpture Catalyst illustrates Section 5.4.4. Frontally Polymerized Artwork in Figure 40 along with other QCC artists’ works.

The above article title links to the online review, and here’s the PDF version. Below is the relevant page!

Frontal Polymerizations: From Chemical Perspectives to Macroscopic Properties and Applications Section 5.4.4 with artwork illustration by Shelby Prindaville.

LSU Vet Med Artist Residency Artwork 20 Process

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Here are a couple of photos of the in-progress Vulture Sculpture! In the first image, you can see how I built an internal armature out of pink styrofoam insulation, wire, and disposable chopsticks. Armatures are really helpful for a few reasons: A) they provide structure and support to bolster strength and keep the clay from sagging, B) they weigh a lot less than clay which makes the piece-in-progress lighter so it puts less stress on weight-bearing areas while wet/uncured C) if you leave the armature inside - like you can do with QuickCure Clay - the finished piece is lighter than if it were solid clay which is typically desirable, and finally D) the armature materials usually cost less than using an equivalent amount of clay.

Then in the second image, it’s midway along; I’m still sculpting the QCC (note the head and wings are unfinished) but it’s taking real shape and I’ve already incorporated the artificial turf, though I have yet to “mold” it with the heat gun. Finally, there’s the finished piece in a similar orientation for comparison!

LSU Vet Med Artist Residency Artwork 20

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This is the final piece of artwork I completed on-site at LSU Vet Med during my two-month summer 2022 residency! I think finishing 20 exhibitable pieces including mixed media paintings, a relief, ceramics, and a sculpture in 7 weeks is a remarkable feat, so I am very happy with my productivity.

I worked right up until the day of the exhibition opening on this piece, but I managed to get it “finished” in time - I put that in quotes as I still needed to briefly borrow it back from the exhibition midway through to put a protective varnish on top!

I had wanted to do a sculpture this whole time because A) I’ve always liked putting on exhibitions that have multiple disciplines and media on display to more deeply engage a broad viewership, B) I wanted to really highlight QuickCure Clay, as I’d helped create it with Dr. John Pojman at LSU a decade ago and it felt right to use it in at least a couple of pieces this summer, and C) I had been given a couple pieces of artificial turf from the wildlife hospital that I wanted to incorporate into artwork in some way, and relatively early on I had a lightbulb moment wherein I thought the astroturf had vulture neck-feather vibes! It worked very well, in that a lot of people couldn’t figure out where the artificial turf was used and at least one viewer told me she thought I thought the gravel I used as an installation aid was astroturf. Another viewer asked me if this was a taxidermied piece, which made me feel really good about the likeness!

I titled this piece Vulture Sculpture mostly because I didn’t have time to think about titling it when I had to make the show labels (I didn’t even think it was likely to get finished for it!), but I also do like the rhyme and the clear identification of the species of the bird. I sold this sculpture that same evening to the fabulous Dr. Mark Mitchell from Wildlife and ZooMed and his partner Dr. Lorrie Hale Mitchell from Integrative Medicine! They very kindly were willing to let me take it on exhibit first (as I’m doing with the rest of the sold paintings), but I made some delicate choices with this piece - the claws, the beak tip - that meant I thought it best to let them just take it after my LSU Vet Med solo show came down instead of potentially injuring the piece in shipping.

This is Vulture Sculpture, a mixed media sculpture of a black vulture including QuickCure Clay and ZooMed’s artificial turf, 13.5" x 7.5" x 20.5", 2022.

LSU Vet Med Artist Residency Artwork 7 Process

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Here are some in-progress photos of Seeing Double!

LSU Vet Med Artist Residency Artwork 7

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Artist Shelby Prindaville holding Tigger the Kunekune pig.

My seventh artwork almost didn’t get made on site - I knew what I wanted to do, but tried in vain to get my hands on a necessary component until Dr. Clare Scully came to the rescue!

Let me back up and explain it from the beginning. A very cute Kunekune pig named Tigger came in for observation and diagnosis and he left the next day feeling much better (and after I gave him a quick cuddle). With his owners’ permission, I decided I’d like to feature him in a painting or two! As I always do when I see a new species here at LSU Vet Med, I started asking about what veterinary materials they use specifically with that species - in this case, pigs. After hearing about a handful of items, the ones that seemed the most useful for my purposes were the pig sorting panels or “pig boards” and Dremel rotary tools (used to sand down hooves). I had brought a rotary tool with me as a sculpting aid already, so that was easy - but the pig sorting panel was a harder acquisition. This is because all the ones they had on hand were made out of plastic, and were pretty clearly intended to be easy to clean in a way that would make it harder to work archivally on top of and they were also obnoxiously colored. Wooden ones are regularly used, too, but there weren’t any in the large animal hospital as typically the wooden ones are just created on demand in a farm woodshop to save money and time.

two small wooden pig sorting panels or pig boards

I started asking all the large animal veterinarians, residents, and students if they knew of a source, put word out via my communications liaison Sandy Sarr, and posted a Craigslist ad… but a week had passed and my show exhibition was drawing closer so I thought I’d need to wait until I could ask my agricultural colleagues back in Iowa. And then Clare came into the room, we chatted, she said she’d see what she could do, and a couple of days later, she had done it! She had found two wooden pig boards for me that were the dimensions I had been looking for from another LSU site and said they were sufficiently used as to be destined for the scrap heap, so this was a much better use for them.

I happily adopted them both and gave them a light sanding and heavy cleaning. For the first composition I had in mind, the slightly smaller and more “standard” board worked better, so that’s what I went with! I would like to photograph it again when I get back home and have access to a large white background, but this image will do for now.

This is Seeing Double, a mixed media relief including Dremel counter relief, QuickCure Clay, PVP Prep Solution (betadine), and acrylic on a used pig board / sorting panel, 29.75x19.25x1.25”, 2022.

Seeing Double painting by Shelby Prindaville

Whiterock Conservancy New Artwork: Surface

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I just finished my second relief from my Whiterock Conservancy residency earlier this summer! This piece depicts an American bullfrog, Rana catesbeiana syn. Lithobates catesbeianus, floating on the surface of one of Whiterock’s turtle ponds.

Here are a couple of process pictures of the underlying QuickCure Clay relief. I began by sculpting the above-water portions of the bullfrog, and then added patches of algae as well.

After I finished the relief elements, I began to paint! I’m pretty pleased with the end result. I finished this piece with two coats of gloss varnish to contribute to a wet appearance.

This is Surface, 12x16x2”, QuickCure Clay relief and acrylic on basswood panel, 2021.

Whiterock Conservancy New Artwork: Attuned

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This is the first figurative piece I worked on at Whiterock Conservancy - a relief portrait of a small species of frog I found in abundance at the river shoreline. The Blanchard’s cricket frog, Acris blanchardi, is an endangered or threatened species in three states so far and is listed as a "Species of Greatest Conservation Need." It is considered a type of chorus frog, and is one of the smallest species of frogs in Iowa. Surprisingly (to me, at any rate) it is also considered a type of tree frog despite being semiaquatic and therefore not having the toe pads of their arboreal brethren.

As always, I began with a contour line drawing. My goal with this piece was a stylized, squashed relief reminiscent of antique bronze relief doors, so after finishing the drawing I began laying in the QuickCure Clay relief. Here are two process photos showing the beginning of that QCC work.

At this point, I got too involved in the actual creation to pause, so we’ll skip ahead to the finished work! This is Attuned, 14x11x1.35", QuickCure Clay relief and acrylic on basswood panel, 2021.

Attuned by Shelby Prindaville, Whiterock Conservancy 2021 artist in residence.

New Artwork: Reclamation

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I’m interested in starting a new body of work that involves growing aragonite and/or calcite crystals atop various substrates including sculptures, reliefs, and found objects. I am attracted to the conceptual and aesthetic power of nature overtaking manmade constructions. Additionally, aragonite and calcite are the crystallized form of calcium carbonate, a natural material that is the primary component in seashells and corals. Marine animals with calcium carbonate exoskeletons are particularly susceptible to ocean acidification; in order to grow these crystals, I am immersing limestone (which is a sedimentary rock composed of marine skeletal fragments) in acid, so in some ways the growth of these crystals is also a funerary rite for marine wildlife dying to climate change.

Here is the first completed work I’ve done using this medium. I’ve titled it Reclamation, and it is a mixed media relief including QuickCure Clay, QuickCure Glaze Coating, acrylic, aragonite crystals and salt on birch panel. It’s 12x9.25x2”.

New Artwork: Catalyst

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Here’s some new artwork to kick off a new year! This piece was inspired by my encounter with two octopi on my last scuba dive this summer with Silviu in Arinaga while on residency at La Pedrada de Noemí. It’s pretty unusual to see the common octopus, Octopus vulgaris, out and about during the day as they are typically nocturnal predators, but it was a very windy day with a lot of churning water and that must have drawn them out.

I have titled this piece Catalyst. It is mixed media including QuickCure Clay, aquabord panel, acrylic, and QuickCure Glaze Coating. Catalyst is capable of being displayed on a pedestal or installed on a wall. It is 13.5x14.5x6.25".

If you’re curious about the sculptural process with QCC, here are a few photos I took along the way. The first two are still in the uncured, sculpting stage and the second two are post-curing but pre-painting. I was actually quite drawn to the piece in its unpainted state, but I had to paint the panel at the very least due to its own mixed media, multicolored composition so I decided to go ahead with painting the whole piece. I might do a different version at some point that’s completely monotone, though, since I liked that quite a lot too.