Happy New Year!

Happy 2011 to my talented friends, far and wide, who have painted and sketched, stitched and sculpted and photographed their way into the world of The Unfastened Heart! I will be waiting, breath held, this month, as the committee decides on the finalists. Best of luck to all of you -- and thank you for adding so much vibrancy and vision to my literary world. You've enriched my days beyond measure.

Spellbound

Artist Juliette Montague sends us this fantastical collage, in which Mariela levitates across the landscape of her life. Spellbound, she is captive to forces outside the boundaries of her known world, floating toward her fate with a willingness that borders on rapture. Thank you, Ms. Montague, for this mystical work.

Anna's Choice

This surreal work comes to us from artist Olga Bubich of Belarus. Mysterious symbols, the roses seem to grow from the surface of Anna's skin. Are they the flowers of memory, of choices lost? I can't help but feel that, under the right circumstances, they will return to life, blooming heartily, vibrantly from their silent places in Anna's soul.

Ms. Bubich writes, "the image also coincides with the whole atmosphere of the book - finding unusual, mystical, supernatural things in the ordinary setting, being able to sense it due to the fragile abilities of one's spirit."

Thank you, Ms. Bubich, for this captivating interpretation.

A Shining Countenance

This transcendent portrait comes to us from award-winning artist Miguel Martinez. With this work, he captures a face of lambent sympathy, of exquisite wisdom. Anna de la Senda would surely regard the world through such a shining countenance as this. Bravissimo. (Miguel Martinez is represented through the Michael McCormick Gallery.)

A Breath, a Quake, a Dream

Egyptian artist Marwa Adel submitted this otherworldly photo, capturing the essence of the young woman as a dreamer who is somehow ensnared by the dream. Both ethereal and cloistered, the dreamer may or may not rouse to reclaim her intended life. While I marvel at her solitude, I yearn for her awakening.

Shimmer

Ms. Carol Nelson has gifted us with these luminous poppies -- layered and extravagant -- creating a shimmering world unto themselves. Certainly Anna would grow blooms such as these on her flower-filled lawn. There's a kind of beatification of the simple in this particular painting, a blessing of small and daily gifts, that somehow reflects back onto the viewer. The poppies shine with such resplendence that, reflected in our eyes as witnesses, so do we.

The Waters of Life

Ms. Tina Calderin manages to capture in her painting a sense of the overflowing gifts which manifest in Anna's life. Entitled The Saints of Cordojo, this work seems to spill off the edges of the canvas with its bright portraits of the Cordojo women. Their bonds to the natural world and to one another are depicted here as generous and seamless, like the flow of the waters of life. Thank you, Ms. Calderin, for this vibrant and mystical work!