Prophecy

"Prophecy" presents a visionary revelation of celestial beauty and harmony. At the base of the painting is shown the realm of mundane life; drab, closed in, and not receiving much light. Victor shows a ladder leading upward out of this gloomy region. Those who take this ladder upwards from the darkness of the physical and material realm are able to reach an area much more spacious and open, infused with celestial light. Here they experience visions of God and of angelic beings.

In the foreground are four prophets who are at this plane of higher consciousness. They face toward a range of mountains. Mountains, where the heavens meet the earth, have been regarded in many cultures as the place where the earthly realm is in contact with the spiritual.

At the center of the painting, we see that the "negative space" between the figures of the prophets also forms another figure, that of a horse. This horse is being ridden by one of the angelic beings shown in the sky.

When the viewer moves from perceiving only the figures of the prophets, to the perception that the space between them is another image in its own right, this perception comes as a sudden flash of insight. Here Victor is communicating very directly to the viewer concerning perception, problem solving, and other areas of human thought.

The shift in perception necessary to see the horse as a figure in its own right comes as a sudden flash of insight, and not by a series of step-by-step, deliberate thought processes. The message communicated here, to the viewer, is that in many areas of life, a sudden perceptual shift can occur, problems can be solved, and the world can instantly take on a completely different meaning.

The angels and other celestial beings depicted in "Prophecy" are drawn from Russian Orthodox Christianity. The angel riding on the horse is the archangel Michael, symbolic protector of old Russia. The city at the summit of the mountain is the Russian "City of Saints", an eternal city where only saints live. The "City of Saints" is a symbolic reference to the highest level of consciousness attainable by a human being.

The four robed prophets are on their way to this City, and bow down to honor it. In the sky above, God the Father, Mary, and three Russian saints protect the City, as does the archangel Michael. Michael also connects the celestial realm with the human world.