Curando El Invierno

Acrylic on canvas

35.43”x35.43”

With Curando el Invierno (“Healing the Winter”), Susana Casillas delivers an evocative vision of rebirth and emotional thaw. A woman—her visage cracked and earthen like frozen ground—gazes upward, surrounded by a constellation of vibrant yellow birds. Her skin bears the texture of weathered bark or cracked ice, alluding to the dormancy and quiet suffering of winter, both literal and metaphorical. Casillas’ recurring visual language—the fissured surface of the soul—meets a new counterpoint here: movement, color, and life. The birds, likely orioles, serve as luminous messengers of hope, flitting around the woman’s face, whispering warmth back into her cold silence. They do not merely adorn her—they appear to be tending, healing, awakening. Perhaps most striking is the transformation occurring at the neck, where her body subtly merges into tree roots, grounding her yet also suggesting growth. She is both part of the earth and reaching beyond it, caught between stillness and resurgence. The composition becomes a prayer to spring—not just of the seasons, but of the self.

In Curando el Invierno, Casillas explores the cyclical nature of healing: how we endure emotional winters, and how, gently, we begin to mend. Through birdsong and earthbound beauty, this piece becomes an ode to resilience—the silent, tender process of returning to life.