REVELATION SKIN

Artist Statement

by VICTORIA LYNN

“We were told to beware the wolf in sheep’s clothing.

We were not told the wolf might be a costume too.”

This painting is a revelation in layers.

A lamb. A wolf. A goat.

Soft fleece, then fang, then horn.

A mask, beneath a mask, beneath a mask.

REVELATION SKIN is not just an artwork – it is an unmasking.

The first of the REIGN series, it breathes through survival, burns with spiritual war, and stands as a psychic portrait of how evil hides in plain sight.

At first, the narcissist plays the sheep – charming, gentle, even innocent. A mask of grace concealing manipulation. Then comes the wolf: the mask slips, the rage emerges. Cold fury, blame, distortion. Finally, we meet the true force beneath it all: the goat – not as a symbol of nature, but as the Machiavellian architect, the mocking demon, the sadist cloaked in intellect. This is Black Phillip – not just personal shadow, but predatory consciousness.

This is the revelation few are willing to see.

But once you see it – you cannot unsee it.

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🐑 TOTEM ONE: THE SHEEP

The Narcissist’s Mask of Innocence

The first mask is disarming.

The narcissist appears soft, loving, even divine.

But this “innocence” is a calculated performance – mimicked empathy, feigned vulnerability, and false light. The sheep is not the wounded child; it is the actor playing the child to groom trust and gain control. It’s how they lure you in.

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🐺 TOTEM TWO: THE WOLF

The Rage Beneath the Charm

When the narcissist’s control is threatened, the wolf emerges. This is the violent turn, the cold fury, the gaslighting, the threats. The wolf is not always physical – it can be psychological, spiritual, economic. This mask is reactive only when exposed. The wolf punishes truth. Its goal is domination. Its method is fear.

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🐐 TOTEM THREE: BLACK PHILLIP

The Demon Behind the Masks

The final figure is not a mask. It is the true form – the entity that orchestrates it all. Black Phillip, the dark goat, is the spirit of strategic sadism. It does not simply react – it schemes. It mocks. It feeds on suffering. It exists not for love or connection but for power and performance. This is not misunderstood trauma – this is conscious malevolence. The predator in its purest state.

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🔁 ALTERNATIVE TOTEM: THE EMPATH’S JOURNEY

There is another reading of this totem. One that inverts the predator hierarchy and instead maps the evolution of the empath through trauma and transcendence.

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🐑 TOTEM ONE: THE INNOCENT EMPATH

The Maiden Self | Collective Innocence

At the base is the empath before awakening. The one who gave love freely, trusted naturally, and did not yet understand that cruelty wears a mask. This version of the sheep is not a predator – it is the unguarded heart. On a societal level, it mirrors our collective blindness to manipulation and abuse.

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🐺 TOTEM TWO: THE WOLF OF REACTIVE ABUSE

Sacred Rage | Fight Response | Survival Self

When betrayed, the empath may erupt. The wolf, in this context, is not evil – it is reactive abuse: the result of being pushed too far, for too long. It is the scream after years of silence. It is sacred rage. Misunderstood, this rage is often used against the survivor to reframe them as unstable. But it is the soul trying to reassert boundaries through fire. Necessary. Human. Holy.

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🐐 TOTEM THREE: THE DARK EMPATH / SHADOW SOVEREIGN

The Witness | The Forged Mystic | Volvenda-Lynn

This final form is often mistaken for evil – but it is survival with empathy intact. This is the dark empath: the one who has walked through hell but chose not to become it. This version of the goat is not the predator – it is the mystic. It sees all, knows all, but wields discernment, not domination. She has empathy and strategy. Power and soul. She is forged in fire, crowned in wisdom, and never fooled again.

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🪞 DUAL SYMBOLISM: ONE IMAGE, TWO TOTEMS

REVELATION SKIN is not a simple allegory.

It holds two truths – two possible timelines.

The Predator’s Totem

Sheep as seduction.

Wolf as punishment.

Goat as domination.

→ A mask of innocence, rage, and malevolence layered into one malignant being.

2. The Survivor’s Totem

Sheep as the tender heart.

Wolf as sacred fury.

Goat as conscious witness.

→ A journey from victim, through fire, to self-sovereignty.

These two realities are not in conflict.

They often co-exist within the same story, within the same person, within the same world.

This painting asks: Which totem are you in now?

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🪞 Narcissus Was Never in Love

“Narcissists don’t love themselves. They love the image of themselves they’ve projected into the world – and they use you to reflect it back.”

The myth of Narcissus is misunderstood. He did not fall in love with himself – he fell in love with his reflection. Narcissism is not self-love – it is self-absence. A hollow core filled with charm, fantasy, and manipulation.

The narcissist cannot truly see or sense “the other.” You are not a person to them – you are an object. A mirror. A function.

They may have experienced early trauma. But where the empath develops empathy, the narcissist chooses ego. Their trauma becomes justification for manipulation, not healing. Their charm is mimicry. Their love is performance. Their soul has become inverted.

This painting is a mythic re-interpretation of Narcissus unmasked.

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✨ “Layers of the Mask: Who Is the Monster?”

“The sheep may be the victim – or the mask the predator wears.

The wolf may be the abuser – or the empath in sacred rage.

The goat may be the devil – or the mystic who sees through all illusion.”

This piece challenges binary thinking.

It dismantles the illusion of clean roles and invites you to ask:

Where do we wear the mask?

Where do we tear it off?

Where does the monster live – outside us, or within us?

We are in a spiritual crisis.

In a time where predators wear priest robes and abusers quote scripture – this painting is a reckoning.

“There is always a witness. And that witness is YOU.”

You, the one who survived.

You, the one who refused to become what hurt you.

You, the one who howled, and healed, and remembered.

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🎨 ARTIST BIO: Victoria Lynn

Victoria Lynn is a multidisciplinary artist whose work fuses sacred rage, mystical eroticism, and post-traumatic resurrection. Her paintings are altars, her digital works are spells, and her storytelling dismantles cultural gaslighting through myth, memory, and the archetypal feminine.

Formerly known as V. Rae and briefly V. Barrett as well as her stage name Volvenda-Lynn aka

THE HONED CRONE,

she also creates under her sovereign name – VICTORIA LYNN – integrating all past selves into one embodiment. Her art is forged in trauma, but speaks in beauty. It is not therapy – it is alchemy.

This piece is for the seers.

The ones who knew the devil was charming.

The ones who still chose to love anyway.

The ones who rose with discernment in their eyes and fire in their bones.

This is not just art.

This is a spell.

This is REVELATION SKIN.

• #Art

• #ContemporaryArt

• #Spirituality

• #TraumaHealing

• #Mysticism

• #SacredRage

• #Alchemy

• #MythicArt

• #NarcissisticAbuse

• #Empowerment