Pretentious Yet Pointless
Sol Aris has not described the aspect ratio of this drawing. Semiotically, we see the leading centralism for strength undulate towards the centre of the image, suggesting unreliability. It is useful to note that the major feature of Shaker æsthetics is that it encourages the viewer to define form in terms of area, rather than representational versimilitude. The adorned background enriches not completely abstract. The artist employs a rectangular grid to contain the colours, which can by this means subsist in a world of their own doing.
The work shares not only Sol Aris's death-identification but also his cosmic perspective and obsession with power. The here and now experience of form and space in this picture, despite appearing disarmingly simple at first glance, create in the mind similarity of beer and white wine... Sol Aris has not completed the price of this sketch.
``What does it all mean? I have little idea... It seems to make use of an abstract idiom which is skirting very near to mere decorative doodling, rather intricately pretty, and yet it is clearly nothing to do with decoration because it's too obsessed.''
[Tate Gallery Guide, 1990, p.232]