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 :
13049 publications

Research Monograph (Working papers)

2011

FEL, F.

Les Achats socialement responsables en France aujourd'hui

ESCP Europe Working Paper, 2011

Paper presented in a Conference

2011

DELVAILLE, P., J.-L. PARE, F. DEMERENS

Les analystes financiers des groupes hôteliers internationaux : utilisation et pertinence de l'information sectorielle

in Proceedings of the ATLAS-AFMI Annual Conference, 2011, Paris, France

Paper presented in a Conference

2011

PRALONG, J., L. CADIN

Les cadres des fonctions publiques confrontés a la "confusion des mandats"

in Actes du Congrès de l'AGRH, 2011, Marrakech

Journal Article

2011

SAUSSOIS, J.-M.

Les cadres et l'ndigestion

in Management, un terrain à reconstruire., CADRES CFDT, September 2011, vol. N° 446-446, pp. pp. 35-42 8 p.

Guest Speaker in a Research Seminar

2011

LAMY, E.

Les chercheurs entrepreneurs et l'essaimage

Séminaire Travail-Innovation-Recherche, projet ANR TRAVCHER. 2011, Cachan, France

Chapter

2011

LEGALAIS, L., I. JEDIDI

Les chiffres de la vie des affaires

in L'état des entreprises 2011., Dauphine Recherches en Management Ed., La découverte, pp. 103-109, 2011

Chapter

2011

MATTEI, L., M.-A. DE ROCQUIGNY

Les chiffres de la vie des affaires

in L’état des entreprises 2012., Dauphine Recherches en Management Ed., Repères, pp. 105-112, 2011

Journal Article

2011

KANNIGANTI, A., N. PRIME

Les collaborations franco-indiennes, au-delà des clivages culturels

in L'Interculturel., ACCOMEX ACTUALITES DU COMMERCE EXTERIEUR, January 2011, vol. n° 97, pp. 41-44

Conference Proceedings

2011

FEL, F., E. GRIETTE

Les critères des décisions de délocalisation vers les pays émergents : une approche empirique

in Les défis du Management International à l'aube du XXI ème siècle, Actes de la 1ère Conférence ATLAS AFMI, Atlas - Association Francophone de Management International (AFMI), vol. N° 1, 2011, Paris, France

Paper presented in a Conference

2011

BUREAU, S., M. BONNAFOUS-BOUCHER, F. CHEVALIER, M. PARTOUCHE, B. PEQUIGNOT

Les entrepreneurs sont-ils plus subversifs que les artistes ?

in Actes du 7e Congrès de l'Académie de l'Entrepreneuriat et de l'innovation - Risque, échec et réussite, 2011, Paris, France