Meet Three Arts InterVarsity Students Who Want to Bring Art Back to the Creator

Just a few blocks from the Bean and the skyscrapers of Michigan Avenue, students from the InterVarsity chapter of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC) gathered for Bible study. They were snacking on chocolate candy and discussing the passage of the Passover dinner in John 17. This was the moment when Jesus prayed for the disciples and then for all believers before his crucifixion, “I pray for those who will believe in me through [the disciples’] message, 21 that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you.” 

“What would it be like if Jesus prayed this over you?” asked Teila Cerillo, a senior studying drawing, painting, and printmaking. 

This question was an invitation for her fellow artists to see how they, too, are part of a long spiritual lineage that leads back to Christ. Teila is one of many artists in her chapter who sees her art as an outpouring of her faith.

Since its founding in 1886, SAIC has produced some of the most influential names in the art world, including the painter Georgia O'Keeffe and the writer David Sedaris. It is a top-ranked art school in the country and home to many brilliant students who perform in a high-pressure environment. Despite the competitiveness and elitism that can sometimes be present in this world, it remains a ripe place for witnessing communities. 

Between rehearsals, touring, and running a studio, art students’ schedules don’t allow them to attend church regularly. But this doesn’t mean they can’t be part of a Christian community. Arts InterVarsity provides a space for them to nourish both their spiritual and artistic life. 

“We seek to create serious artists with serious faith,” said Henry Lucey-Lee, the National Director of Arts InterVarsity. Here are three student leaders for whom this is true. 

Teila Cerillo 

Outside the dining commons, Teila and her InterVarsity chapter set up a table filled with a stack of glossy magazines, scissors, and button pins for their “Buttons and Brownies” outreach event. It immediately caught the eyes of students passing by. Many of them flipped through the magazine pages and collaged them to make half-inch pins. While they did this, Teila joyfully shared about their fellowship on campus. 

Teila’s journey at SAIC hasn’t always been characterized by levity and hope. Her first year of college was characterized by overwhelming sadness. She moved to a city that was cold, loud, and busy, and she felt out of place. She missed home and often found herself in tears while attending a church service on a Sunday morning and meeting with her InterVarsity chapter on a weekday evening. 

Even in that grief, she found community. “I have people, and they know God, and they can pray over me, and I’m safe here, and I can be in love with the Lord here,” she said. 

The joy of the Lord came over Telia when she attended a Spanish-speaking church and she felt the palpability of God’s restoration through a woman praying for her. “It was like baptism,” she said, “It was a renewal of the joy that I had lost.” The peace she received at that moment was the same peace that allowed her to say yes to leadership. 

On the day of Telia’s baptism, the clouds had shrouded the sky. Nonetheless, she had felt like her insides were radiant. This event was also the same inspiration for her painting at the BFA show, which is an image of water and light illustrated with brightly-colored geometrical lines and circular forms. 

“I wanted to do something that makes people think about God,” she said. As a landscape artist, she was inspired by the place of her baptism, and then reflected upon Jesus’ baptism, specifically the moment when the heavens opened up and the Holy Spirit descended upon him like a dove. “It is a reflection of the radiance and glory of the Lord.” 

Through her art, Teila desires to bring people back to God, seeing him as the most influential force in her work, animating every stroke she makes on the canvas. As she graduates and steps into the world beyond the walls of art school, she dedicates this labor of love to God. 

Magdalena Perez-Moore 

Finding an InterVarsity poster was an answered prayer for Magdalena. She was walking around SAIC during a campus visit, a little nervous about not finding a community like the Christian club she had started in high school.  She was relieved to find out that there was a fellowship at SAIC because she knew she wasn’t going to be alone in pursuing Jesus. 

Magdalena is currently a sophomore and a Visual Communication Design major who believes everything she does is connected to her faith. Even the things you may think are not Christian, are still Christian “because it’s your perspective, and everything you interpret is through a knowledge of God,” Magdalena said. 

Her faith inspires her to share the Gospel in everything she does, and it allows her to navigate conversations with non-Christians on campus. One time, a professor asked her to do a design about why God doesn’t exist. Magdalena made God’s design bright and the reasons for his non-existence dark. 

“It was a chance to say ‘God exists, and you need him to navigate these things,’” she said. 

When interacting with people who have dark thematic elements like self-harm and suicide in their work, Magdalena turns to prayer and Scripture to guide her. Specifically, she looks to Jesus, who was filled with compassion in Matthew 9:36 when he said the crowds were like sheep without a shepherd. “God is very empathetic as a father,” she said. “He sees everything and has the whole plan for our lives and this earth laid out.” 

Although the art world can at times be competitive, elitist, and unsympathetic, she has found a safe place in her chapter, where her friends do critiques of each other’s work and exchange both technical feedback and spiritual insight as fellow Christian artists. 

“Students are experiencing the safety, beauty, and generosity of God,” said Alexa McLean, the Associate Director of Arts InterVarsity. She has also mentored student leaders at SAIC the past few years and has seen them live out their values in their work, their chapter, and their campus. 

“As a designer, you just follow God wherever he’s going to lead you and try to do your best from there,” Magdalena said. 

She sees the real need for Christian artists to keep in step with the Spirit amid the pressures of art school. Because Christ’s love isn’t earned or merit-based, Magdalena knows her worth isn’t tied to her excellence, and this gives her greater confidence. 

Ana Dias 

At an early age, Ana loved the way movies allowed her to live different lives. Now that she’s a senior studying Film, Video, and Media at SAIC, she loves having an outlet to share the gospel. “God created everything,” she said. “I believe that art is for him, through him, and by him.” 

Ana’s desire to grow in her art made her interested in SAIC. Although she felt confident that Chicago was where God was calling her, coming here meant stepping into the unknown. She’s an international student from Brazil who went through a long and arduous application process. Despite many years of waiting, she experienced God’s providence—from getting housing a few weeks before school started to finding a Bible study in her first week on campus. 

“When I got here, the first thing that I said was, ‘if there is no Bible study, I’m starting one,’” Ana said. While walking around her school’s org fair, she met an InterVarsity student leader who tabled at the event and invited her to join their Bible study. This was the beginning of her involvement with the chapter. Now, she, too, is a student leader alongside Teila and Magdalena. 

“Everything that you do with the right heart posture is worship to the Lord,” Ana said. This applies to being a student leader and being a filmmaker. With every frame, Ana uses film to help people understand that they are loved. “It is on us as Christians to bring art back to God.” 

Teila, Magdalena, and Ana have committed the work of their hands to the work of spreading the gospel in a beautiful, compelling, and excellent way. This is the gift that Christian artists like them bring to the body of Christ and the world—they provide a means through which people can experience God and, as a result, reorient themselves toward him, no matter where they are on their spiritual journey. 

One artwork at a time, these students witness to the Maker, who created everything out of nothing in the beginning. Like a city built on top of a hill, they cannot be hidden.

Click here to learn more about InterVarsity's Arts Ministry!