The votes have been tabulated, and we are pleased to announce the winners of our And the Glass Handed Kites vinyl competition!

I would like to thank everyone for their participation in both the creative portion and the voting. The response has been overwhelming! And I’d just like to remind everyone who entered, that even if you did not win, your art will still be used in some way in the redesign of our website, slated to be revealed next month. TUSIND TAK!

Contest 1: Writing

Winner: Scent by Ilona Inezita (Indonesia)

That night, I was taking a walk inside my head, when suddenly a strangely familiar scent tickled my nose. I could not recognize it right away, so I closed my eyes and breathed in. I swear I could sense a layer of bitter sweetness that reminds me of something familiar and comforting. But soon as I breathed out, I realized what it was—it was the scent of failure. The revolting, ghoulish, yet—a little—comforting scent of failure. It made me feel anxious and light-headed, so I lighted up a cigarette to cover it.

As the fire burned the leaves, I watched the smoke dancing wonderfully before vanishing into thin air. I put the cigarettes between my lips, inhaled, and blew smoke rings as I exhaled, lots of them. I watched them floating away, sometimes on top of each other that they quickly broke into nothingness. I kept making and watching those smoke rings, and they kept dancing and destroying each other in the process. They were so beautiful that my hands moved on their own—they tried to catch the smoke rings. But the moment my hands touched them, they disappeared.

It made me feel morose- the fact that the smoke rings disappeared when I tried to catch them, because they reminded me of my dreams. The more I make them, the more they destroy each other, the more they destroy me. The more I reach for them, the more they vanish into thin air, back to their peaceful habitat. The cigarette was almost reaching its end, so I took a last drag, dropped it on the ground and crushed it. The smoke gave me a hopeless last performance, and faded away into nonexistence.

The absence of the dancing smoke brought back the faint scent of failure, along with my anxieties.

I sighed.

Contest 2: Art & Graphic Design

Winner: And the Glass Handed Kites by Kim Vermeer (The Netherlands)

Contest 3: Photography

Winner: A Chinaberry Envoy to the Open Skytes by Ravern Ava Vermount (Malaysia)