From Pieces to Portraits

How a CEIVA Collage Workshop Helped Students Experience God’s Restoration Through Art

Sometimes the most powerful part of the creative process is the moment everything gets cut apart.

At I AM ART Camp at CEIVA, a collage workshop helped elementary students explore identity, brokenness, and restoration through one surprising material: their own artwork.

Students turned painted papers into life-sized self-portrait collages.

Led by Grace Christian Academy students Brooklyn Edmonson and Haleigh Carr, alongside Athentikos team member Amy Martinez, the workshop included nine CEIVA elementary students and centered on the themes of storytelling, self-expression, and God’s redemptive love.

From Colorful Beginnings

The workshop was inspired by Eric Carle’s The Mixed-Up Chameleon, a story about a creature struggling with identity and longing to become something else.

Students began by creating colorful painted papers—bold, textured, and full of life. Those papers then became the raw material for life-sized self-portrait collages.

The workshop began with vibrant painted papers filled with color, texture, and possibility.

Cut Apart, Then Rebuilt

But first, the paintings had to be cut into pieces.

As students cut their work apart, leaders guided a conversation about confusion, mistakes, and the reality that life can sometimes feel mixed up. They connected those feelings to Romans 3:23, helping students begin to understand brokenness in an age-appropriate but meaningful way.

Cutting the paintings apart created the turning point in the story of the artwork.

Then came the turning point. The cut pieces were rearranged and reassembled into something new. What had been separated became a new image. What looked disrupted became a different kind of beauty.

A Story of Restoration

Broken pieces can become something whole, meaningful, and beautiful again.

What began as scattered pieces became a new portrait shaped by creativity and hope, that life can feel mixed-up sometimes, but with God’s help, he gives us purpose!

At Athentikos, we believe creativity can help people encounter hope in ways words alone sometimes cannot. At CEIVA, this workshop helped students see that even scattered pieces can become something beautiful again.