Aaron with the Scroll of the Law

'Aaron with the Scroll of the Law' of 1875, now at Southampton City Art Gallery, belongs to Solomon's sustained engagement with Jewish religious subjects that runs alongside and interweaves with his classical and Christian imagery. Aaron, the first High Priest of Israel, appears here as a monumental ritual figure carrying the Torah scroll, giving Solomon the opportunity to paint elaborate priestly vestments and liturgical objects from his own cultural and religious background. The date 1875 places this two years after Solomon's arrest and conviction, making it a work produced from within his social marginality — a painting of religious dignity and authority by a man who had lost most of his professional standing. Southampton City Art Gallery's holding makes this one of Solomon's most geographically dispersed religious subjects.

The priestly vestments are an opportunity for Solomon's characteristic attention to decorative surface detail: the breastplate's twelve stones, the embroidered robes, the elaborate headdress all require precise rendering of colour, pattern, and material texture. The scroll itself is painted as a sacred object, its physical presence given weight through careful attention to the texture of parchment and the quality of the rolled form.