why we exist.
Most artists in the Canadian Church are loved for what they produce and rarely pastored for who they are. They get invited to serve (a set, a song, a poster) and much more rarely invited to be formed. Their church is glad of the work and has no idea what to ask them about it. And the questions that actually keep artists up don’t come up in an ordinary small group:
- 1Is this worth pursuing a career in?
- 2What do I do with the envy I feel when someone else’s work is received?
- 3How do I keep making when nobody has asked me to?
- 4How do I hold a calling that pays irregularly and costs constantly?
They are also scattered. There is no city in the country with enough Christian artists in one place to gather a serious cohort locally. So we stopped treating that as a problem and built for it: a room that meets online every month, ateliers of three or four that meet more often than that, and four days a year in one building where the work gets shown.
To create a movement of artists who are serious about their faith and their craft that would bring beauty and restoration in this world.
We are passionate about pastoring artists as artists; gathering makers from across the country into a year of spiritual formation, a theology of making, and community honest enough to show unfinished work in.
what the year looks like.
A one-year intensive discipleship program for artists.
how we serve canadian artists.
The first people in Scripture said to be filled with the Spirit of God are craftsmen, and the filling is for skill: artistry, design, the working of metal and stone and wood and cloth. We build a year on the conviction that your craft is not just the delivery vehicle for the spiritual thing; it is the spiritual thing.
Every month has something to do, not only something to think about: the examen, a sabbath actually taken, a lament written, a week of looking at one object. Teaching is a quarter of our time, on purpose. This cohort is all about engaging in the gifts that God has entrusted to us as artists.
Every artist is placed in an atelier of 3–4 who journey together the whole year, with a coach ready to walk with you in your artistic calling and destiny. Twelve months with the same few people is what makes honesty possible and vulnerability less daunting.
Conferences are good at inspiration and bad at formation. Studio runs twelve months, because becoming a different kind of maker takes longer than a weekend and nobody’s character changes on a schedule. We are intentional about doing life together, at all walks of life.
Most artists have an audience and no witnesses. An audience consumes; a witness knows what it cost, remembers the early drafts, and can tell you the truth. Every month, one artist shows real work to the room, and we close by praying and prophesying over them by name.
meet our team.
Artists and pastors who walk with the cohort all year.
Jess is an award-winning short filmmaker, fine art film photographer, musician, and creative visionary passionate about telling redemptive stories through art. As the founder of Renaissance Canada, Jess is committed to equipping and inspiring artists…
Karina is an American-born abstract artist who grew up in Portland, Oregon, and has called Canada home for the past thirteen years. After more than a decade in Calgary, Alberta, she recently relocated with her family to Yellowknife, Northwest…
Amber Bent is a Calgary-based visual artist whose creative practice explores the power of art as a language for expressing what words cannot always hold. With a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology and a minor in Fine Arts from the University of Calgary,…
Phenix Warren is a Juno Award–nominated producer, mixer, and multi-instrumentalist currently working out of Pocono House Studios in Calgary, Alberta. He loves to help artists find their authentic sound. Alongside 15+ years serving in worship ministry…
interested in a future cohort?
Studio is a closed cohort this year. Artists join by application, invitation and conversation, so if you’d like to talk about a future year, we’d love to hear from you.