Consider two paintings by Picasso.
The first: Science and Charity, painted when he was fifteen. A doctor takes a sick woman’s pulse. A nun holds a child. The scene is realistic, technically masterful, emotionally clear. You know immediately what you’re seeing and what to feel.
The second: Les Demoiselles d’Avignon, painted ten years later. Five figures, fractured into geometric planes. Faces that look like African masks. Bodies that seem to exist in multiple dimensions at once. You’re not sure what you’re seeing. You’re not sure what to feel.
Which one do you prefer? Which one do you understand?
Most people find the realism easier. We can say “that’s beautiful” or “I like that.” The Cubism is harder. We have to work to see what’s there. We have to construct meaning rather than receive it. And somewhere in that difficulty, a thought creeps in about the abstract: My kid could have painted that.
But could they?
This week, I wanted to better understand abstraction—what it is and how to get better at it—because I know, intuitively, that it’s a core skill of innovation. I set out to confirm that intuition and landed somewhere I never expected.
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Thanks for exploring with me! Read or listen to more at Innovating Out Loud on Substack ... and join us next month for our live Innovating Out Loud webcast. Our next guest is Juliana Tioanda of Xbox! Register at regenerouslabs.com/innovatingoutloud.
Sources for your poetry practice:
Start with Poetry 180 (loc.gov/poetry/180) — Former Poet Laureate Billy Collins selected 180 poems for high school students, one for each day of the school year. They’re designed to be understood on first read. No analysis required. Just experience.
Sources
* O'Sullivan et al. (2015), "'Shall I compare thee': The neural basis of literary awareness," Cortex; University of Liverpool fMRI research showing poetry activates central executive and saliency networks
* Biomimicry Institute design methodology
* “The Teaching of English” (1902), quoted in Jackson Hole Classical Academy
* Cambridge University Poetry and Memory Project; New York Times, “Memorize That Poem!” (2017)
* City Journal, “In Defense of Memorization” (2023), citing cognitive development research
* McKinsey (2018), “AI, automation, and the future of work”
