Interview: Avery Silliman
Luca Curci talks with Avery Silliman during CANVAS INTERNATIONAL ART FAIR 2026 at Palazzo Albrizzi-Capello in Venice.

Avery Silliman is a multidisciplinary artist whose practice investigates the symbolic tension between memory, landscape, and the unknown. Born in Dallas, Texas, and graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts with highest honors from Abilene Christian University, her work combines drawing, found materials, and organic substances to construct poetic visual narratives shaped by history and personal experience.

Through layered compositions and abstract aerial perspectives, Silliman explores how individual stories are formed within shifting environments, reflecting the fragile balance between constancy and uncertainty. Her research-driven approach transforms symbolic processes into immersive visual fields where the unseen becomes perceptible, inviting viewers into a contemplative dialogue with time, place, and identity.

Luca Curci – What is art for you?
Avery Silliman – Art is a universal form of communication, a visually unifying bridge. Its catalytic process of storytelling and purpose challenges viewers. Art is a conversation, a time capsule that can challenge and can simultaneously comfort those who take the time to lean into its intended purpose and how this relates to their own. Like a historical narrative, art is a creative expression of the past, present, and holds promise or warning for the future.

LC – What are you currently working on?
AS – I am creating a continuation of this body of work through the exploration of float glass frames becoming part of the canvas as a visual expansion on the concept of embracing the unseen. I am also working on paintings and drawings for a book about a guiding whisper.

LC – What’s your background? What is the experience that has influenced your work the most?
AS – Throughout my life, I struggled with anxiety. I sought out security and found empty promises. A traumatic event gave my Mom a 2% chance to live. I was faced with the choice of fear, or trusting that somehow in this unknown, I would be held. Not knowing if she would recover, I found myself held, comforted, and given an inexplicable peace by God. He gave me strength and peace (Psalm 84:5,11 and Psalm 89:17,18). He gave me the words I needed when I did not know what to say. From this moment forward, I realized what it meant to trust God in the unseen and the unknown.

Just like a sailboat, I hoisted my sails trusting in the midst of unknown waters, trusting the wind would come. He would be my guide, my direction, and my friend in our journey together. In the seasons of quiet and waiting, I was incubated in a greenhouse. Held by a Gardener, who tended to my every need, patiently watering and comforting me as I grew beneath the surface. Slowly, I came to recognize how the greenhouse was my seal, the Gardener was my friend, and the Sun was my nourishing Father; who controlled the seasons and loved me through them all.

These events inspired these artworks, where the foundation of each drawing symbolically notes aerial perspectives of different geographic locations. Each location is painted in naturally derived mediums like tea and coffee. This foundation symbolically depicts how our lens and belief is the foundation of our journey. The words and collage materials correspond to the stained foundation in the composition, structurally and liturgically. Each artwork composed an individual story of the unknown and the unseen, illustrated as sailboats and greenhouses. These drawings hang in as a symbolic map of time, space, and proposed perspectives. This structure represents how individual stories,works of art,are part of a larger story, a universal love greater than ourselves.

LC – What do you think about art on social media? Are they turning into the new showcases of contemporary art?
AS – Social media is a glimpse of the artwork itself. I believe that artwork is an experience that can not be replaced by an image of the work – especially in a casual scrolling platform. Social media does not maintain the physicality and entity of presence that impacts the viewer and cannot replace the showcasing of physical art. The physical showcasing of art prepares the mental space and heart posture of the viewer to experience and relate to the artwork, where a screen can aid in describing the essence of the work.

LC – What issues do you intend to deal with in the future?
AS – My artwork ponders the unknown while embracing the tension between trust and fear. Life continually proposes the question of what fastens and steadies us in the middle of the unseen and the unknown. I intend to continually create work that causes us to reflect on where we look for security and identity over time and space while providing symbolic keys to unlock new thought.
These keys are in the form of symbolic depictions of intimate relatable stories which fit into a grand landscape covering potential postures towards unknowns.

LC – Do you think ITSLIQUID GROUP can represent an opportunity for artists?
AS – Yes, I think ITSLIQUID GROUP can represent an opportunity for artists because it provides platforms with a wide range of demographics that interact with the artwork and artist’s content that is published. ITSLIQUID GROUP builds relationships with the artists individually and connects international artists on a personal level.

LC – Did you enjoy cooperating with us?
AS – I enjoyed cooperating with ITSLIQUID GROUP. They prioritize a relationship with the artist and support the artist throughout their journey.