FERNANDO DA SILVA

About the Artist

Born in Torreira, Murtosa (Aveiro, Portugal) and later relocating to Connecticut, Fernando da Silva trained in graphic design but always gravitated toward painting and drawing.

His work reflects the dual roots of his life—European heritage and American-New England influence—giving his visual language both nostalgic depth and modern urgency. The blending of traditional styles (such as synthetism, constructivism, and impressionism) with contemporary concerns forms the basis of his practice.

Artistic Practice

Fernando da Silva’s work unfolds as a dialogue between memory and momentum, structure and spontaneity. He draws from his background in graphic design and his early interest in drawing, then turns toward painting as a medium of emotional and formal exploration. His pieces bear traces of historical art movements yet avoid mere imitation: they bring forward the lyricism of color, the rhythm of line, and the quiet force of gesture into the current moment. Each canvas becomes a place where he interrogates the way old forms meet new landscapes, how individual identity meshes with collective memory, and how the visible world holds secret registers of feeling.

Using a palette that evokes both dawn and dusk, his compositions often suggest urban frameworks, fragmented landscapes, and emotional portals. His visual language carries a sense of longing—an echo of translation between place, time and self. In this way, his art aligns intimately with the mission of the iO Arts Center: to create experiences where art is not only seen, but felt, traversed and lived.

Featured Exhibition at iO

Unsung Cities

Solo Exhibition

In Unsung Cities, Fernando da Silva presents new works that explore urban life from the margins: the overlooked corridors, the back alleys, the subtle intersections of structure and softness. Through large-scale paintings, mixed-media drawings, and installation elements, he invites viewers into cities that exist equally in memory and in the imagination.

The exhibition is arranged in three zones:

Thresholds & Frames: works that examine the boundary between inside and outside, public and private, structure and space.

Echoes of Passage: compositions built from layered forms that suggest movement, migration, arrival, departure.

City of Reflection: quieter pieces that invite stillness and introspection—corners of urban life where light and shadow play, where the everyday whispers its story.

By activating iO’s gallery with thoughtful light, ambient sound and minimal furnishings, the environment becomes part of the work itself—encouraging visitors to pause, inhabit and reflect. Fernando’s art, in this context, becomes a bridge between architecture, memory and participation.

Alignment with iO Arts Center Mission

Fernando da Silva’s practice resonates deeply with iO’s core values of interdisciplinary creation, sensory awareness, and transformational experience. His blending of design and fine art reflects an openness to multiple modes of making; his themes of threshold, translation and belonging echo iO’s commitment to bridging divisions—between self and other, urban and rural, art and life. Through his work, viewers are invited into a heightened state of seeing: not just what a city is, but what a city feels like. This aligns with iO’s vision of art as an immersive, connective, conscious act.

Artist Philosophy

“In every structure there is a crack where light enters.

My cityscape is not only what stands—but what passes through, echoes, becomes.”