What do the Kyiv-Mohyla Academy and St. Peter's Basilica have in common? How does the color scheme of Van Gogh's paintings relate to social engineering? The answer to both questions: the work of a strategic idea.

For a session in the creative practices course, participants of the Executive MBA (EMBA-37) received an assignment from art historian Diana Klochko: to prepare a photo depicting an idea that personally impressed them. Here was Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa and Pierre-Auguste Renoir's Woman with a Parasol, photos related to phenomena such as the conquest of Everest and the expansion of space. Behind each photo was a personal story and a great idea.

One of the EMBA participants chose the painting The Potato Eaters by Vincent Van Gogh. Despite the dull, depressive colors, despite the sad expressions on the faces, the family enjoying potatoes leaves a positive impression. They care for each other, they are happy with simple food, they are tired after working together, two generations of the family gather at one table and celebrate life. The de Groot family (depicted in the painting) can convey: one can be happy in quiet everyday life. The participant shared these impressions. The simplicity of a simple life, being worthy of one's work and the place where you are — this is Van Gogh's idea that inspires.

After a series of corrective questions from Diana Klochko: "Isn't this a hymn to poverty? Don't you think the color scheme of the painting reflects the very color of potatoes? And the shapes of the bodies here also slightly resemble potatoes, don't they?", the group's attitude towards the plot on the canvas "shifted". Yes, it is still an idea about continuity and succession, but no longer about family. We become what we eat. We resemble what we consume. The idea that ultimately emerged: all our experiences are formed externally — it is also embodied in "The Potato Eaters".

An interesting lively discussion of ideas realized in works of art and transformed in the experiences of those who interact with art began with a thorough lecture by Diana Klochko "The Path of an Idea Beyond Borders: Michelangelo, Caravaggio, Bernini, Pinzel, and Roiburd". Ms. Diana talked about working with a strategic idea, tracked in specific art history cases how a person comes to a certain idea, how the idea spreads in different contexts, and what are the mechanisms to scale the idea.

The art cases analyzed in the lecture are as intense as a good adventure-detective series. For example, the dome of Santa Maria del Fiore.

Florence aspired to become a city of artists and for that built a magnificent cathedral — a symbol of the greatness of human talent. For almost forty years, Santa Maria del Fiore stood without a dome. Filippo Brunelleschi took on the work, promising the city authorities: the dome would be constructed from the inside, the cathedral would not be covered by any scaffolding, and it would look beautiful during construction. It was a radically new construction technique. The dome arose: light, octagonal, made of bricks, it was assembled from puzzle-like facets and secured at the top with an architectural lantern. This little lantern on top amazed contemporaries. Such a thing had literally never been seen before. Moreover, one could climb the dome, the lantern was somewhat like an observation deck, Florentines literally gained a new perspective, a new viewpoint on the city.

To translate the technology from unique to universal — this was Michelangelo's mission regarding the dome-with-a-lantern. He recreated Brunelleschi's dome but added windows, light, making it seemingly lighter and more elegant. The dome of St. Peter's Basilica in Rome has since become a symbol of belonging to the Catholic Church. It was a powerful scaling of the idea: it transformed from archaic to industrial.

The same dome with a lantern adorns the Church of the Annunciation of the Kyiv-Mohyla Academy, which can be literally seen from the windows of kmbs. Why did the "Catholic" dome end up here? It was a clear message of loyalty and involvement: the Academy, where Greek and Latin are taught, is integrated into the European world, does not conflict with Catholics, but together with Western Europe forms a common idea. The lantern on the dome by this time was no longer just a successful architectural solution, but a symbolic message, a cultural code.

On such not-so-obvious examples, kmbs participants had the opportunity to trace ways of forming and scaling ideas, to capture the moment when an idea becomes a message about the world's readiness for transformation. And ultimately, that the main thing in the work of ideas remains the person who forms the idea and who is inspired by it.

Diana Klochko on the Ongoing Game of Ideas