Improbable Chair by Galeries Lafayette Art Thinking

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The Improbable Chair by Galeries Lafayette is all about bringing together artists and entrepreneurs, linking art with business in a new way.

It supports creative practices by connecting artists with entrepreneurs, businesses with cultural institutions, and artistic creation with business strategy. It encourages everyone to embrace the "improbable" to think like creators. Through a unique method called "Art Thinking," developed at ESCP, the Galeries Lafayette group and ESCP offer a way to support, encourage, and spread the act of creation.

 

Guillaume Houzé, Brand and Communications Director, Galeries Lafayette

A few words from
Guillaume Houzé
Brand and Communications Director, Galeries Lafayette group

“The Improbable Chair is all about bringing together artists and entrepreneurs, linking art with business in a new way. It supports creative practices by connecting artists with entrepreneurs, businesses with cultural institutions, and artistic creation with business strategy. It encourages everyone to embrace the ‘improbable’ to think like creators. Through a unique method called ‘Art Thinking’, developed at ESCP, the Galeries Lafayette group and ESCP offer a way to support, encourage, and spread the act of creation.”

Guillaume Houzé, Brand and Communications Director, Galeries Lafayette group Photo Credit: ©Lucasziwel

Sylvain Bureau, Scientific Director

A few words from
Sylvain Bureau
Professor at ESCP Business School
Scientific Director of the Improbable Chair

“Our initial belief was simple: to make creation accessible to as many people as possible. To achieve this, we developed a method called Art Thinking, which characterises how artists, entrepreneurs, and scientists go through similar steps in the creative process, such as gift-giving, deviating, destroying and drifting. For 15 years, our Art-Thinking seminars have trained thousands of students, entrepreneurs, managers, and researchers across a dozen countries and twenty universities and schools. Partnering with Galeries Lafayette group, a company with a strong entrepreneurial DNA, our chair combines theory and practice to amplify this approach and promote creators and creation in the broadest sense.”

Professor Sylvain Bureau, Scientific Director of the Improbable Chair

Objectives

The Chair has two major complementary goals:

  • Support scientific research to better understand creative practices
  • Teach the Art Thinking method and spread the Improbable pedagogy worldwide

Art Thinking not only helps participants unleash their innate creative potential; it also promotes collaboration, listening, leadership, negotiation, and constructive dialogue. Participants learn to question themselves, leverage failure, establish partnerships, and develop an agile approach to uncertainty.

Three areas of activity

Research and development

  • Scientific publications
  • Doctoral theses and final dissertations
  • Improbable Siesta: seminar bringing together researchers, artists, and experts in creation
Teaching

  • Spreading the Improbable method at ESCP and beyond
  • Designing initial training in Art Thinking
  • Training Art Thinking instructors
Events

  • Conferences and workshops on Art Thinking
  • Exhibitions and Improbable openings
  • Improbable residencies (art­ist/sci­en­tist/­en­tre­pre­neur triads)

“This Chair is the story of an encounter between visionary creators who understood early on how future generations of students and entrepreneurs would need artistic and creative practices to prepare for the world of tomorrow. Through this collaboration, ESCP is grateful to the Galeries Lafayette group for opening up new playgrounds for unprecedented and improbable creations!”

Pascale Pernet, Director of chairs and corporate sponsorship
ppernet@escp.eu

Focus on...

Group photo at the inauguration of the Improbable chair

Article

When Art meets Entrepreneurship

On Tuesday, 19th March 2024, Léon Laulusa, Dean and Executive President of ESCP, Jean-Stéphane Arcis, President of the ESCP Foundation, Philippe Houzé, Chairman of the Management Board of the Galeries Lafayette group, and Guillaume Houzé, Brand and Communications Director, Galeries Lafayette group, signed the first Chair dedicated to artistic and entrepreneurial creation.

Display :
13042 publications

Paper presented in a Conference

2019

SCHMID, S., S. MITTERREITER

Top Managers' Career Variety and their Board Tenure: The Moderating Effect of International Education and In-House Work Experience

in 45th EIBA Annual Conference 2019, 2019, Leeds, United Kingdom

Journal Article

2019

BARRIOS, A., E. REFICCO, R. TABORDA

Training effects on subsistence entrepreneurs’ hope and goal attainment

EDUCATION AND TRAINING, 2019, vol. Vol. 61 No. 7/8, pp. pp. 895-917

Guest Speaker in a Research Seminar

2019

CHAMAKIOTIS, P., N. PANTELI

Transforming commitment into social value in online health communities: Our journey with MedicineAfrica

Funded Workshop: ‘Exploring the educational value of digital health platforms: Insights from MedicineAfrica and Care Opinion’. 2019, Brighton, United Kingdom

Published Case Study

2019

MENDOZA, C., V. MALLERET

Trendy Look : de la carte stratégique aux indicateurs de performance

2019, CCMP

Published Case Study

2019

MENDOZA, C., V. MALLERET

Trendy Look : From Strategy Map to Performance Indicators

2019, CCMP

Journal Article

2019

VERZAT, C., F. BORNARD, C. GAUJARD

Un détour par l'imaginaire pour comprendre les fondements psychosociocognitifs de l'éducation entrepreneuriale

REVUE DE L'ENTREPRENEURIAT, 2019, vol. 18/1, pp. 109-140

Chapter

2019

SELF, L., P. CHAMAKIOTIS

Understanding cloud computing in a higher education context

in Advanced Methodologies and Technologies in Network Architecture, Mobile Computing, and Data Analytics., M. Khosrow-Pour (Eds.) Ed., IGI Global, pp. 261-273, 2019

Conference Proceedings

2019

VOYER, B., M. SANGLÉ-FERRIÈRE

Understanding Customers' Propensity to Avoid Seeking Assistance: The Role of Individual Differences and Construct Measurement

in EMAC Annual conference, European Marketing Academy, 2019, University of Hamburg, Germany

Journal Article

2019

SCHMITT, J., S. FEIEREISEN, D. RASOLOFOARISON, K. DE VALCK

Understanding emerging adults' consumption of TV series in the digital age: a practice-theory-based approach

JOURNAL OF BUSINESS RESEARCH, 2019, vol. 95, pp. 253-265

Journal Article

2019

COLLA, E., M.-E. RUIZ MOLINA, C. CHASTENET DE GERY, M. SCHULTZ, M. DEPARIS, L. LEMMET

Understanding franchisee performance

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF RETAIL AND DISTRIBUTION MANAGEMENT, 2019, vol. 47, 7, pp. 733-751