“I think the more I notice, the more I hear God through the beauty,” Jen says.
Art therapist, daily doodler, textile lover, collage maker, and creative observer.
Jen Alward lives in Eagle River, Wisconsin, where creativity runs through everyday life.
“I bounce all over,” Jen says.
She doodles daily with pen, often adding a tiny image to her devotional. Collage is another favorite because, as she puts it, “collage is a go to as I love layering different mediums and textures.”
She also works with textiles, quilts, crochet, and appliqué, including an ongoing quilt depicting Bible stories.
For Jen, creativity isn’t one discipline. It’s a way of paying attention.
Art, Faith, and Helping People
Jen is trained as an art therapist and works professionally with art to help people “process emotions, gain perspective, and heal.”
She’s also exploring what it looks like to bring those skills into faith communities.
“I’m regularly working to merge that with my faith as I write and co-author books and create courses/trainings for individuals and professionals,” Jen says.
Recently, she was invited to guide a clay activity for her church’s women’s retreat, built around the theme “pressed.” She has also contributed to online Bible art journaling workshops and created self-paced courses.
“The project for church is a clay activity to go with the retreat’s theme of ‘pressed.’ The Bible art journaling session I created for the workshop, based on Ezekiel 37, combines ink drawing, journaling, and collage.”
Jen has also co-authored a book and is developing training to help churches and ministry leaders use art in response to crisis, trauma, disaster, and ongoing mental health needs.
A Creative Life That Moves
Jen’s creative process is not especially tidy or predictable.
“[It’s d]efinitely more spontaneous. Even when I make plans they change as I create,” Jen says.
A lot of her making happens from the corner of the sofa, morning and evening, though she also has an art table and easels for larger projects.
And she rarely travels without something to work on.
“If I’m a passenger for a long drive or traveling by plane,” Jen says, “I always make sure to have a portable project I can work on handy.”
That ordinary, portable quality is part of what makes Jen’s creative life interesting. Art isn’t something she waits to do when conditions are perfect.
It comes with her.
Why She Creates
“For such a simple question this is strangely hard to articulate. It’s something I’ve always done in some way or another. Capturing beauty that captures my attention and showing it to others is almost a compulsion, it’s just part of who I am. I think the more I notice, the more I hear God through the beauty if that makes sense, and I just want more.”
Jen often gathers photographs, images, and small things during walks.
Sometimes the creative act is simply noticing.
She describes “just stopping to ponder and praise God for what He just reminded me of through that thing.”
When she makes something original, the process itself becomes a place of discovery.
“I love getting lost in the process and what God reveals to me in the layers of it,” she says.
Sometimes she surprises herself.
She has caught herself “looking at the end product and wondering ‘who made that, I like it.’”
Because Jen naturally thinks visually, making art around Scripture also helps her remember what she has read and what God has shown her through it.
What Keeps Her Looking
Jen finds inspiration almost everywhere.
“Sometimes the constant inspiration is overwhelming as time is so limited,” she says.
Artists past and present inspire her. Nature does too. So do her art therapy clients.
“Transformation,” she says, “the potential of things in process, stories, and the memories represented by ruins also spark my imagination.”
She has plenty of favorites, although choosing only one is apparently not her strength.
“I don’t know if I have one favorite of anything, except maybe the color green,” she says.
Keep Going Through the Awkward Part
Jen has simple advice for artists who get discouraged halfway through something:
“It’s never going to look finished until it is.”
“In other words, don’t stop when you hate it, don’t get discouraged when it’s not looking good,” she says.
Her encouragement isn’t to wait for a grand project.
It’s to build creativity into ordinary life.
“Just make something today. Find a way to incorporate art into your daily living. Make it simple (as in, it feels simple and natural for you) and make it for you.”
That may be a daily doodle.
A portable project.
A quilt that grows slowly.
A photograph from a walk.
A few minutes of noticing.
The point is to keep making.
Foundations and Finding a Way Forward
Jen is a graduate of the God Loves Art Foundations Art Ministry Course.
Looking back on that experience, she says: “Being validated and encouraged to make my own art and to think of ways to minister outside the church has given me hope again. I was in a dark place when I first connected with God Loves Art, wondering if anyone in our church would ever see art as more than holiday decorations. I’d stopped trying and was isolating.
Going through the courses and hearing from others who also connected deeply with God through their art inspired me to make art just for myself and God. It helped me formulate some thoughts better, reconnect with my own art journey, and see paths forward that weren’t someone else’s style. It gave me freedom to trust how God was leading me and let him pull all the pieces together. After years of dead ends and rejection, I was recently invited to lead an art activity at a ladies retreat at church this spring!”
Of Jessie’s role as instructor and mentor, Jen says: “So very down to earth, relaxed, welcoming, and encouraging! I felt welcomed and connected with her right away. She accepts everyone where they are. She challenges and inspires me in art making and thinking of new ways to minister to others through art…and to minister to artists themselves too. It was so validating to take her courses and to continue to be part of the community she is developing.”
Jen’s story is one example of what can happen when creativity is allowed to grow in its own shape.
Not a formula.
Not one medium.
Not one kind of ministry.
Just a life of noticing, making, learning, and responding.
Among the books Jen returns to are The Chronicles of Narnia, Anne of Green Gables, Art & the Bible by Francis Schaeffer, and Naming the Animals by Ned Bustard and Stephen Roach.
Some favorite passages include Psalm 23, John 1:5, and Matthew 5:13–16 in The Message.
Her visual influences range widely too, including work by Kevin Carden, Snehal, Stanka Kordic, Elena Skoreyko, David Amberzumjan, Vanessa Horabuena, and Edgar Degas.
To find out more about Jen Alward’s work and to be encouraged by her even more, please visit her here:
Learning to See Studio’s Website
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