Art and innovation: artist as levers for innovation

Art et innovation: les artistes comme levier d'innovation

Sara Fernandez Garcia ()
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Sara Fernandez Garcia: LEMNA - Laboratoire d'économie et de management de Nantes Atlantique - Nantes Univ - IAE Nantes - Nantes Université - Institut d'Administration des Entreprises - Nantes - Nantes Université - pôle Sociétés - Nantes Univ - Nantes Université

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Abstract: In an ever-changing world marked by volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity (VUCA), traditional innovation models are struggling to keep pace. The rise of open innovation, based on diversity and cooperation between disciplines, is a necessity (Chesbrough, 2003). In this context of open innovation, collaboration between artists and STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) experts is proving to be a powerful lever for rethinking creative and design processes. An aspect often underestimated is the importance and strategical benefits of artists and STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) experts working together. I explore the conceptual framework of the benefits of such collaboration, and more importantly the specificities of artists' skills in such collaborations. This literature paper explores how artists, through their intuitive and critical thinking, adaptability and experimental approach, foster the emergence of new perspectives in business transforming traditional ways of thinking and energize creative processes. Far from being mere catalysts of creativity, they transform innovation models by bringing a disruptive vision and encouraging risk-taking. And how their integration into R&D projects can foster a renewed approach to innovation. Firstly, I focus on the relationship between creativity and innovation, and outlining the different management dynamics required by creativity and innovation as different realities. This poses a major organizational problem in the generation of new knowledge. To move forward on this question, I explore the Antal & Strauß (2013) studies of artistic interventions in companies, as a form of harmonizing these two seemingly conflicting dynamics. This reflection enabled to move forward on the mutual utility of Art and Innovation, and the benefits of integrating artists into innovation processes. I then present artists as a motor for breaking with the established framework and the limits of oriented expertise, thanks to the skills that are specific to their cognitive style. Bringing to the conclusion of why the hybridization of art and innovation (and not instrumentalization) can represent an asset for innovation as a motor for access to new knowledge, as a method of questioning, and as a factor of learning and adaptation to the prevailing uncertainty.

Keywords: creativity; collaboration; artist in organization; open innovation; Art; Art open innovation artist in organization collaboration creativity (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025-06-28
Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://hal.science/hal-05528758v1
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Published in R&D management, Jun 2025, Pisa, Italy

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