Teala Avery (b. 2002, CT) is a 2024 Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Spelman College, where she earned her B.A. in Photography. As a photographer, Teala is a translator, using the camera to bridge the spirits of those willing to look, to confront, and to be observed. Through constructed portraits and documentary photography, Teala captures the fellowship and essence of familial, platonic, romantic, and self-relationships. Her photographs speak to the safety and healing present within Women and Non-Binary relationships. 

Her most recent exhibition was a group show titled Let Go: An Ode to Releasing (2024) at MINT in Atlanta, GA. Teala exhibited her undergraduate thesis, What Brought Us Together Is Belief in her senior group show A Home I’ve Never Been Before (2024) at Echo Contemporary in Atlanta, GA. In 2024, she was inducted as a member of Phi Beta Kappa Society and Tsuda International Student Network. She has curated two solo exhibitions: Taking Up Space (2023) at Kamikawa House in Tokyo, Japan and Acts That Shape Us (2020) at Otis Library in Norwich, CT. She taught a series of English art classes at Oekaki Pocket in Tokyo, Japan and participated in the Oceania Art-as-Knowing course in Suva, Fiji with the University of South Pacific. She received the Atlanta Center for Photography Equity Scholarship (2024), the Air Canada x Bridging Foundation Travel Award to Tokyo, Japan (2024), the Spelman College Undergraduate Research and Training Programs Unit Travel Supplement to Ithaca, NY (2023), and the Anderson Ranch Arts Center Spelman College Photography Program Scholarship to Snowmass Village, CO (2022).