First-move advantage in chess draw given best play prevails. Even if it cannot be proved, this assumption is considered "safe" by Rowson and "logical" by Adorján. Watson agrees that "the proper result of a perfectly played chess game ... is a draw. ... Of course, I can't prove this, but I doubt that you can find a single strong player who would disagree. ... I remember Kasparov, after a last-round draw, explaining to the waiting reporters: 'Well, chess is a draw. World Champion Bobby Fischer thought that "it's almost definite that the game is a draw theoretically". Similarly, British grandmaster Nigel Short wrote that
Soldier at a Game of Chess echo-like profile of the face and cap in the background plane directed downward toward the game, for it becomes almost inevitable to see the soldier's alter ego; an effect that both pulls the man into the background of the composition and pushes him forward towards the viewer, again, canceling out indications of depth. Here, Metzinger uses a checkerboard and wooden table to establish a clearly demarcated fore-plane that is non-fixed in relation to which its 'hovering' chess pieces are situated. This profound battle between planimetric and perspectival dimensions as here in "Soldier at a Game of Chess" has precedence in