In Soldiers, Orlik depicts two male figures with long legs which show beneath their shell-like armour which also acts as a knee-length cape and from beneath which protrude their white, tusk-like swords, the long sheaths of which push out their capes to the side. They appear like two beautiful, rippled conch shells, and their covered heads (covered with the same shell/cape) appears bird-like, pointed like a beak, so that they appear like two doves. They are brothers in arms and one has his arm around the other and they look at each other, seemingly lovingly. Their beautifully muscular legs and their Greek statue proportions, make them athletic and perfect.

The soldier’s suit of armour is their wings and they are reminiscent of depictions of Renaissance angels and in particular St Michael the Archangel dressed in his splendid armour ready to defend with his avenging angels against the dragon in the book of Revelations. Or they are like Dante’s two soldier angels in Purgatorio (Divine Comedy, Purgatorio, VIII, l. 26-27) with their two short swords and meticulous, practiced drill and perfect timing who see-off the serpent. Or they are maybe the angels that guard the Garden of Eden and the way to the Tree of Life.

The soldiers have the anonymity of soldiers who dress alike and this is exacerbated by the material which covers their heads – bird like and beaked, a sleek distortion of a helmet. Perhaps the light shining from them is so bright that a human could not look at them directly and so they must be covered. Their short curved, tusk-like swords gives an organic/animal dimension, exacerbated by their bird heads and shell armour but they are other-worldly. They are perhaps part of the Biblical angelic hoard who are sent by God to protect Elisha, the prophet. God allows the prophet (the artist?) a glimpse of his angelic armies, so that his sight can pierce through the physical dimension to the metaphysical one and the artist’s/prophet’s eyes are openend to another dimension. Like Blake, the artist/prophet can see angels and the angels are messengers between the two realms, divine and human.