Have a Heart

Gov. Susana Martinez wants to add portraits of foster children needing permanent families to the artwork embellishing the Roundhouse.

On Friday, the governor said she would ask the New Mexico Legislature to add portraits from the Heart Gallery, a program linking adoptive parents with children in need of forever families. The announcement came at the opening of the semi-permanent Heart Gallery in the reception area of the Governor’s Office.

John Yaeger, assistant director of the New Mexico Legislative Council Services, said the council was researching the issue.

“I want to see these pictures decorating the walls of this entire building with our beautiful art,” Martinez said. “It’s important that we show off our best and brightest and these are our kids.”

The governor’s exhibition is divided between success stories and children still in need of adoption. The nine portraits were taken by professional photographers who donate their time and talent to the program.

The exhibit is the Heart Gallery’s third home alongside similar displays at Christus St. Vincent Regional Medical Center and University of New Mexico Children’s Hospital. Since its founding, the Heart Gallery has placed 5,000 foster children in permanent homes, both in New Mexico and across the country. It has been copied with 125 chapters throughout 47 states and landed coverage in Parade magazine, People and The New York Times, as well as on “The View” and NPR, CNN and “The Today Show.” The nonprofit celebrated its 10th anniversary in June.

It all started when founder Diane Granito was hired as a foster and adoptive recruiter for the New Mexico Children, Youth and Families Department. The interviewer handed her an in-house magazine called Futures with fuzzy mug shots of needy children. Unimpressed, she recruited professional photographers through Santa Fe gallery owner Gerald Peters. The first show debuted with 50 portraits at his gallery. Six children were matched with families.

“These children lived in fear of the people who were supposed to raise them,” Martinez said.

During the ceremony, Martinez announced that a boy named Esai, whose portrait had been hanging on the waiting-for-parents side of the entryway, had been adopted.

“This is exactly what the Heart Gallery is,” said CYFD Secretary Yolanda Deines. “We’ll be moving him to the happy endings side.”

Finding a permanent family transformed Faye (her real name is Francis) Mathey’s life nine years ago. Mathey was adopted by Jackie Mathey, the photographer who took her portrait.

Seeing Faye’s photograph brought back a flood of memories to her father, Courtenay.

“It just really hit me how powerful that image was, and I think about all we’ve been through together. We got a forever daughter,” he said, fighting back tears.

“Everyone is special,” he said. “So many kids don’t know that.”

Now 19 and attending the New Mexico School for the Arts, Faye wants to become a composer. She played her original composition, “Legend,” at the gallery opening. When her soon-to-be adoptive mother arrived in Albuquerque to take her portrait, she had no idea what was going on.

“I just thought I was dressing up in pretty clothes,” she said.

Jackie had arrived with a friend who was a stylist because they had heard Faye liked to play dress-up. The two spent the first half-hour of the drive back to Santa Fe in silence and the second in tears.

“Faye was frightened to death of all of it,” Jackie said. “She really was clueless.”

When Jackie drove into her driveway, Courtenay was standing there waiting for her. The couple had talked of adopting when they were dating; they already had a son.

“When I drove up, he was there in the driveway saying, ‘Where are the Polaroids?’ We were on the same train of thought,” she said.

“You don’t know what to expect” at these assignments, she said. “What I found was someone extremely happy. She has such a bright light, and she just sparkles.”