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 :
13050 publications

Paper presented in a Conference

2008

QUAGLIA, R., P. VIOTTO

A longitudinal study of Italian top CEOs: impact on individual background ans career choices

in Proceedings of EURAM (European Academy of Management), 2008, Ljubljana & Bled

Journal Article

2008

SUCCI, C., L. CANTONI

A Map of eLearning Acceptance (MeLA) and a Corporate eLearning Readiness Index (CeLeRI)

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF ADVANCED CORPORATE LEARNING (IJAC), 2008, vol. Vol. 1, Issue 1, pp. pp. 39-47 9 p.

Journal Article

2008

ZHOU, W., S. BANDYOPADHYAY, P. PATHAK

A mechanism for online advertisement placement to deter click fraud

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF ELECTRONIC COMMERCE, Winter 2008, pp. pp. 9-28 18 p.

Journal Article

2008

KUNSCH, P., A. RUTTIENS, A. CHEVALIER

A methodology using option pricing to determine a suitable discount rate in environmental management

EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF OPERATIONAL RESEARCH, March 2008, vol. Vol.185, Issue 3, pp. pp.1674-1679 6p.

Conference Proceedings

2008

DESLANDES, G.

A Preliminary Editorial, Managerial and Strategic Assessment of France 24

in 8th World Media Economics and Management Conference (WMEMC), Catholic University, WORLD MEDIA ECONOMICS AND MANAGEMENT CONFERENCE, 2008, Lisboa, Portugal

Paper presented in a Conference

2008

HAENLEIN, M.

A social network analysis of customer-level revenue distribution

in Proceeding of INFORMS Marketing Science Conference, 2008, Vancouver, Canada

Textbook

2008

SCAGNELLI, S. D.

Accounting and Financial Statements

2008, Celid

Paper presented in a Conference

2008

GASTON-BRETON, C., A. BOUTIN

Acculturation impact on advertising startegies: Application for emerging markets

in Proceedings of the 7th International Marketing Trends Congress, 2008, Venice, Italy

Paper presented in a Conference

2008

TAFUR, J.

Alternative market options for European low cost carriers

in Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on Industrial Engineering and Industrial Management, 2008, Burgos

Research Monograph (Working papers)

2008

BICK, M., T.-F. KUMMER, W. RÖSSIG

Ambient intelligence in medical environments and devices

ESCP-EAP Working Paper, no. Mai, n°36, 2008