A VSE, or “Variable Stencils Edition,” is a series of artworks created using stencils, in which each print, though part of a limited edition, features unique variations. These differences may involve colors, backgrounds, intensity, or manually added details, giving each piece a semi-unique character. This technique—frequently used in street art, especially by Shepard Fairey—strikes a balance between the visual cohesion of an edition and the singularity of an original work.
This composition features a monumental elephant, an embodiment of peaceful strength and ancestral memory, raising in its trunk a stylized flower—delicate corolla of hope and renewal. The contrast between the animal’s massiveness and the fragility of the flower suggests a restrained tension between power and vulnerability, dominance and tenderness, as though true greatness lies in the ability to protect what is fragile. The background, radiating in red and gold rays inspired by the visual codes of totalitarian propaganda, is here subverted: rather than proclaiming a will to power, it emits a solar energy oriented toward unity, awakening, and peace. The mandala-like symbols on the cloth and the flame adorning the elephant’s back evoke a spiritual, almost sacred dimension in this journey toward equilibrium. The image thus becomes a vision of quiet resistance—an appeal to inner peace and the strength that lies in compassion.
