Flickering candlelight is a world culture symbol of faith and hope. It also represents the light of human mind flashing in the darkness of surrounding ignorance (think of the French Enlightenment figures Diderot and Voltaire).

1. The well-known expression “hope springs eternal” can be associated with the flame of a candle – we find this symbolic connection between the flickering candlelight and the hope of salvation in a raging sea expressed in an early painting by the artist To the Safe Haven
2. The Rose girl waiting for her sweetheart in the Daisy Games: the light of the small candle nearby speaks of the tentative hope that her feelings will be reciprocated. Any minute a light ‘breeze of indifference’ can extinguish this newly arisen and tenderly glowing flame of love.
3. The candle in this painting is the ‘light of reason’ coming from someone in their good old years continuing to enlighten the younger generation. As the poet said: “Shine all the time, forever shine, the last days’ depths to plumb…So runs my slogan – and the sun’s!” (Vladimir Mayakovsky)