If car designs were assigned to art movements, the Kia Soul would be considered a cubist. There’s the George Braque, Fernand Leger  and then there’s the Soul. One poet, Kenneth Rexroth, described cubism as ” the conscious, deliberate dissociation and recombination of elements into a new artistic entity made self-sufficient by its rigorous architecture.” That’s an applicable description on how the Soul balances form, function and the statement that it chooses to make by describing it with an exclamation mark. The Soul has made it design statement and stuck with it. It’s nimble, small and specific, and there’s nothing quite like it.  The only tweak have come under the pedal, where the engine has been revised for fuel efficient gains of 29/36 mpgs.  The 1.6 liter engine produces 135 hp and the 2.0 liter, which makes 164 hp. The Eco package includes a stop-start system. Here we have an affordable statement car that costs somewhere between $15,000 to $20,000, depending on options! The only somewhat compatible contenders include the Scion xB and the Nissan Cube.

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