The island’s literary and visual journal returns after a two-year hiatus.

When art and literature converge, the whole can be greater than the sum of its parts.

At least that’s publication editor Victoria Josslin’s hope for the latest issue of “Exhibition,” the island’s long-time journal of visual and literary arts, back on the stands after a two-year hiatus.

“One of the goals was to make the design of the magazine part of its content,” Josslin said. “I wanted it to be one organic whole, within the confines of reality, flexibility and randomness.”

Upon the publication of the last “Exhibition” issue in the spring of 2005, Josslin put out a call for submissions based around the theme “Drawing the Line: Borders, Boundaries, and Horizons.”

She began collecting entries, hoping the Bainbridge Arts and Humanities Council would publish a subsequent edition in the fall of 2005. Resource constraints, however, put the magazine on hold.

The good news was that when Josslin got the go-ahead to publish two years later, a lot of her legwork was done – she and her literary and arts editors had a passel of submissions to pore through from artists on Bainbridge and throughout North Kitsap.

Josslin says in this issue’s introduction that she hoped to make the theme “just consistent enough to produce a coherent magazine, and beyond that minimum, the more variety the better.”

As prepared as she was for variation, though, the beauty and range of interpretations still surprised her.

Numerous literary inclusions grapple with metaphorical line-drawing, notably generational divides. Carol Wiley Cassella’s short story “Falfurrias, Texas” centers around a parent with Alzheimer’s. Laurie Greig’s poem “The Loss of You” offers a despondent mother’s take on her daughter’s sudden, incoherent rage against her. And Kevin Elliot Milam’s “Lonely Belly” expresses a young father’s ambivalence about his children and his wife’s identity as a mother.

“Who knew?” Josslin said of the parent-child theme that spontaneously emerged. “I certainly didn’t plan that. It just happened.”

On the visual front come more literal but no less unexpected variations.

The magazine’s cover art, Elizabeth Smith’s dramatic, nearly photographic line drawing “Glow” was done with the aid of a magnifying glass.

With “Open,” children’s book author Barbara Helen Berger assembled a fantastical winged bird cage. Gregory Glynn’s columnar carved wood installations create a framework for a feature interview; Glynn is the 2007 recipient of the Amy Award for emerging island artists under the age of 35.

And from title to subject matter, Diane Walker’s warm and witty “Dad Draws the Line,” synthesizes Josslin’s theme completely. In the photograph, an actor applies eye liner in preparation for a performance as his daughter looks on.

Josslin, who has lived on the island since 1986, has a rich history in visual arts and arts criticism. She majored in painting at Occidental College in Los Angeles and earned a master’s degree in art history from the University of Washington in 1995. She worked as an art critic for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, contributed to the arts publications “Reflex” and “Aorta, and founded the online arts forum Artdish in 1999.

She’s currently the publicist and education director for the Gallery at Bainbridge Arts and Crafts, work that she says gave her valuable exposure to the business of print publications prior to signing on to helm “Exhibition.”

Josslin and her editors – Doug Nathan and Karen Perry for the literary arm and Caroline Cooley Browne on the art front, along with designer Jeanette Alexander – determined how the visual and literary submissions would work together on the printed page.

Josslin said that while some editors don’t believe in putting literature and images on the same page, for her that’s one of the most fun parts of the job.

“It creates conversation that’s literary and visual,” she said.

The current issue of “Exhibition” includes a call for artists for, fingers crossed, a fall 2007 edition. Josslin isn’t quite prepared to share her long-term vision for the publication, but she said, “There are things I want to continue to build on. I want the next issue to be a little different.”

About the next theme, “Prints, Patterns and Echoes,” Josslin said, “I hope I get some prints, but I know that whatever I get will surprise me.”

In the meantime, she’s grateful to the BIAHC for supporting the publication; she believes that having a place to publish encourages local artists to get their work, which so often gets made privately or in small groups, out there.

“It’s stunning, the talent that’s around here,” she said.