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 :
13052 publications

Chapter

2012

JOFFRAIN, W.

Tempo e Fisica: Tempo assoluto, tempo relativo e freccia del tempo

in Tempo al Tempo., Francesco Arecco Ed., Mimesis Edizioni, pp. 81-82, 2012

Book

2012

DÍAZ, C., O. BAJO RUBIO

Teoría y política macroeconómica

Antoni Bosch ed, 2012

Published Case Study

2012

BERTOLDI, B., R. QUAGLIA, J. A. DAVIS

The Agnelli's and Fiat: Family Business Governance in a Crisis (A)

2012, Harvard Business School Publishing

Chapter

2012

BERTOLDI, B.

The Agnellis and Fiat: Family business governance in a crisis

in Harvard Business Publishing., Davis, Bertoldi e Quaglia Eds, Harvard Business School, Cambridge, 2012

Journal Article

2012

HAENLEIN, M., A. KAPLAN

The Britney Spears universe: Social media and viral marketing at its best

BUSINESS HORIZONS, 2012, vol. 55(1), pp. 27-31

Journal Article

2012

DESLANDES, G.

The Care-of-Self Ethic with Continual Reference to Socrates : Towards Ethical Self-Management

BUSINESS ETHICS : A EUROPEAN REVIEW, 2012, vol. 20(4), pp. 325-338

Journal Article

2012

ARNAUD, G.

The contribution of psychoanalysis to organization studies and management: an overview

ORGANIZATION STUDIES, 2012, vol. 33(9), pp. 1121-1135

Paper presented in a Conference

2012

WILKEN, R., B. SKIERA, M. CORNELISSEN, M. EISENBEISS

The Deal is On: Understanding and Managing Deal-of-the-day Promotions

in Proceedings of the EMAC Conference, 2012, Lisbon, Portugal

Research Monograph (Working papers)

2012

JOUSLIN DE NORAY, T.

The Distribution of Social Capital,Confidence in Public Bodies, and Electoral Participation in India

Condorcet Center for political Economy, 2012

Conference Proceedings

2012

DESLANDES, G.

The Dynamics of Identity and Narrative Dissonances: A Case Study of Cultural and Media Management

in European Academy of Management (EURAM), Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University, European Academy of Management (EURAM), pp. 38 p., 2012, Rotterdam School of Management, Netherlands