
Pablo Picasso's version of refactoring: Reducing a drawing to 12 perfect pen strokes - edw519
http://artyfactory.com/art_appreciation/animals_in_art/pablo_picasso/pablo_picasso.htm
======
mynameishere
_that it captures the absolute essence of the creature in as concise an image
as possible_

No, it doesn't. It looks like crap. A bull without the massive bullhead is no
longer a bull, but some freaky artist's conceit attached to a declaration,
"This is a bull." The fact that he changed the pene so wildly between pictures
is a hint that he's playing a joke on us.

Here are some superior, simple bull pictures:

[http://www.doublevisionarts.com/images/Boxenbaum/Bull%20seri...](http://www.doublevisionarts.com/images/Boxenbaum/Bull%20series%20drawing%203.gif)

[http://www.kshdevelopment.com/DaliPictures/Dali's%20Bullfigh...](http://www.kshdevelopment.com/DaliPictures/Dali's%20Bullfight%20Num%203.jpg)

~~~
wheels
You're reading the commentator back into the artist. When I see the series I
see it as a commentary on reductionism with an element of humor and absurdity.

A lot of times people get so caught up in the pretension associated with
"serious" art that they ignore that it's often supposed to be funny. I
remember getting scowled at once at the symphony for laughing at loud at a
certain point that was (for the musically inclined) obviously a joke.

~~~
lsb
__Verdi Spoiler Alert __

In Verdi's Simon Boccanegra at Covent Garden this past spring, Fiesco says
"Simone, I morti ti salutano!" -- "Simon, the [previously-thought] dead salute
you!".

To the classically minded, it's a riff on the gladitorial salute to the Roman
emperor "Nos te morituri te salutant" -- we who are about to die salute you.

Takeaway lesson: only date people who laugh as much at Latin jokes as you do.

------
msluyter
I think that the analogy between Picasso's process and software refactoring is
rather weak. We generally consider refactored code to be better and less
crufty than the original (one would hope!) But the refactored bull isn't
necessarily "better" than the original. It's simply more abstract, and not
merely more abstract in a purely functional way. The final result is still
highly stylized and instantly recognizable as the work of Picasso.

What might be usefully applied to programming is that in abstracting the bull
to its minimalistic essence, Picasso illuminates the bull's underlying
structure. Perhaps by removing code we can also get a clearer idea of the
fundamental workings of a system. ;)

------
wheels
That's a lithograph, not a sketch as the title would suggest. All of those
were actually made by adding material back to the carving.

Here's a better article on the process:

[http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1248/is_n3_v81/ai_136...](http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1248/is_n3_v81/ai_13609943/print)

~~~
seregine
Great article! This quote makes me grateful for version control:

Indeed, Picasso seems to have put into practice here an idea he had expressed
a few months earlier when speaking of one of his paintings: "If it were
possible, I would leave it as it is, while I began over and carried it to a
more advanced state on another canvas. Then I would do the same thing with
that one. There would never be a |finished' canvas, but just the different
|states' of a single painting, which normally disappear in the course of
work."(4)

------
thebigshane
Very interesting metamorphisis. But what is up with the first "Pablo Picasso
Facts" at the bottom of the page... "Picasso was the greatest artist of the
20th century."

~~~
olavk
It is not an unreasonable claim. Of course it's a bit jarring to see it stated
in such a matter of fact way, when we are used to hearing that everything
related to art is "subjective".

But if we look at somewhat objective criteria like influence on other artists
and his range of different styles and media, he is probably unsurpassed in the
20th century. And then his productive years nicely overlaps with 3/4 of the
century (during which he kept reinventing himself), while many other artists
are associated with a single period or movement.

Of course that doesn't mean that he has to be your favorite artist.

------
ars
“Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there
is nothing left to take away.” - Antoine de St. Exupery

One of my favorite quotes. All programmers should keep this in mind when
working.

~~~
vchakrav
That should be -- "Perfection is achieved when there is nothing left to take
away."

~~~
ars
Is the translation wrong (I got it from wikiquotes), or do you disagree with
what he said?

~~~
vchakrav
Oh, I was just applying the principle of the quote to itself.

~~~
jamesbritt
Then you should remove all the words from the quote, leaving nothing more to
take away.

(Yes, I consider the quote superficially appealing but essentially content-
free.)

------
llimllib
Anybody know where you can get a print of this?

I found the final frame
([http://www.artrev.com/art/detailview.asp?pid=8877781318&...](http://www.artrev.com/art/detailview.asp?pid=8877781318&aid=119&mid=120&original=No)),
but I'd like to have the whole series.

------
mojuba
The sad truth is that the majority of people would prefer the "verbose"
version, no matter how genius is your cut-down version. Same in software
engineering: nobody cares how beautiful and concise your code is, you are paid
only for the results.

~~~
olavk
You should probably not draw the analogy to software too far. Clearly users
appreciate (and are willing to pay for) beauty and simplicity in user
interface. Look at the iPod. But of course customers don't care if your code
is minimal or a convoluted mess, as long as the app works.

20th century art is a little different because the process is part of the
exposed product - the art piece here is not the last plate (which would be a
bit boring on its own), but the whole sequence.

~~~
mojuba
Unfortunately bloatware sells well, too - take Microsoft or Adobe.

Why this analogy: succinctness and beauty is not appreciated in our industry,
whereas it should have been a standard, like in mathematics or physics, where
it is appreciated and "standardized" so to say. In math and physics you have
to express youself in the most concise way. And I have never seen beauty and
succinctness of the code being a _requirement_ as a part of making software,
unfortunately.

Edit: "bloatware" pertains to both the code and the interface.

------
tyn
"...that it captures the absolute essence of the creature in as concise an
image as possible"

I'm not convinced.

(This is not an expert's comment, I know nothing about modern art)

~~~
olavk
So you think the image could be even simpler and still convey the image of a
bull?

I would guess that he made a plate XII where he simplified further by removing
the balls or horns, and then realized that it was no longer the image of a
bull.

~~~
tyn
It doesn't capture the essence of the creature in the sense that it lacks
certain elements that one can assosciate with it, e.g. power (it looks very
timid to me). Probably I misinterpreted the world "image", I did't take it
literally as you suggest.

------
dangoldin
These are pretty cool. It also looks neat starting from the end and working
towards the beginning.

