From Elsa Schiaparelli seeking out Salvador Dalí for Lobster Dress (1937), to the Yayoi Kusama robots applying splotches of paint to Louis Vuitton boutique windows—brands and artists are old bedfellows. Today, such collaborations can be found just about everywhere: at art fairs, banks, department stores, art institutions, or even along a desert highway (see artist duo Elmgreen & Dragset‘s 2005 project Prada Marfa).

There is good reason, according to several speakers at the Art Business Conference at Paris’s Grand Palais on February 18, where we are reminded that Chanel is a major sponsor. During a day of panels addressing topics ranging from new gallery models to the influence of design, restitution laws, and Morocco’s art scene, a number of participants discussed the benefits of artist and commercial partnerships, which have been on the rise as brands compete for influence and the art market seeks to expand.

In fact, if aspiring brands don’t engage with artists, they “will simply be degraded to commodities or cease to exist,” warned the conference’s keynote speaker, Vadim Grigoryan. In his book, Art Thinking, which Grigoryan presented, he chronicles the ups and downs of a recent “wave” of artist-brand collaborations, and makes a case for how, if done thoughtfully, they can inspire all parties involved.

The Art Business Conference, Paris 2026. Photo by David Owens

Where Collaborations Go Wrong

For artists, commercial partnerships can also offer a financial lifeline, as I was recently told, plus the possibility of reaching mass audiences, which even the most established of art-world stars don’t necessarily enjoy. Interviewees for this story also agreed that thanks to more positive examples, there is less stigma around the notion of artists dipping into commercial ventures. Nevertheless, brands have a responsibility to respect an artist’s autonomy and vision, which is why these collaborations also raise questions about what they really mean for artists.

Take Judy Chicago, who recently wrote a candid play-by-play of her misadventure with Google, which commissioned her signature “Through the Flower” images to be installed in the Thompson Center, a historic building in downtown Chicago. Faced with Google’s mismanagement and disrespect for Chicago’s artistry, on top of the labor and costs incurred, she and her husband, the photographer Donald Woodman, had to ultimately pull out.

After sharing her experience online, her article garnered thousands of views and received a rush of social media commentary from others who had similar, disheartening experiences. “I’m just exhausted by clients acting like artists are line items rather than working people,” wrote one artist on Facebook.

Judy Chicago standing in the center of the Thompson Center atrium with elevator glass wall in background, Chicago IL. 2025. Photo: ©Chicago Woodman LLC, Donald Woodman/ARS, New York

According to Grigoryan, most artist-brand collabs fall short of their potential, resulting in simple marketing stunts, or worse—exploitation of the artist. An example was recently highlighted by Frida Kahlo’s great-niece, who told the London Times she worried the commercialization of Kahlo had gone too far, with branded merchandise and even apartment buildings that don’t align with what the artist was about.

“Just slapping something on the bag, on the car, on the bottle… is not enough,” Grigoryan said. “Brands want a limited edition, or a window display, and there is nothing wrong with that, but it’s how you do it.” Successful collaboration, he argued, relies on intellectual exchange between both parties, not the decorative distortion of an artist’s voice and vision. “If you [as a brand] benefit from and enrich your approach through an artistic eye and a different point of view, then it’s fantastic, and you can commission whatever you like—if it’s done with respect, mutual benefit, and understanding, in the spirit of true collaboration.”

We know that is not always the case, and yet, when done well, the possibilities for making a cultural impact are real. Chicago, for instance, had an entirely different experience when working with Dior, which she wrote, “was the greatest creative opportunity I had ever had.”

As part of that collaboration, Chicago created a giant goddess figure for Maria Grazia Chiuri’s January 2020 couture show at the Rodin Museum gardens in Paris. Inside, the artist hung monumental fiber banners, which later grew into a world-touring, participatory quilt called What If Women Ruled the World. In hindsight, Chicago realized that, unlike with Google, it had been made possible because she had been in direct communication with Dior’s upper management during the five years of their collaboration.

Making Collaborations Work

Experts tell me the key is finding the right fit and “balance” between collaborating parties. “There needs to be shared values, and a shared universe created between the artist and brand,” said Solenne Blanc, CEO of the Beaux Arts & Cie group, also speaking at the conference. Enabling that right match is a whole job unto itself. The French IDA consulting agency and artist residency, founded by Florence Marmiesse and Camilla D’Alfonso, has taken on the task, coupling corporations with artists, negotiating the financials, and defending the artist’s vision. They also step in if brands cross the line by interfering with the creative process.

IDA founders Camilla D’Alfonso and Florence Marmiesse. Photo courtesy of IDA.

“We try to get the simplest brief possible for the artist, because that is where the magic happens,” explained Marmiesse, also at the Paris conference. She said artists were often unsure of where their inspiration would lead them, so the parameters of a given commission need to account for that.

“We make sure the artists are free to create,” added D’Alfonso, who remembers stopping one corporation from complaining about the artist’s color choice (Chicago heard the same from Google), and demanding constant visual updates of the artist’s progress. “I told the client: ‘You chose the artist for their universe; now let them work.”

“Brands have to accept a degree of uncertainty about the outcome of the creative process,” when collaborating with artists, agreed Blanc. “This requires brands to take risks and be willing to relinquish control,” which is nothing like commissioning a design for an advertising agency.

Artist Alexandre Singh and art historian Natalie Musteata told me they were pleasantly surprised to find that their recent project filming inside the Galeries Lafayette department stores in Paris at night was one such freeing experience. The duo won a Galeries Lafayette grant, inviting them to create a short film inside the luxury brand’s stores, in partnership with Misia Films. Their short, titled Two People Exchanging Saliva (2024), is now up for an Oscar.

While working with the Galeries Lafayette, “there was a willingness to take risks and to see women and fashion as a complex and thematically rich field,” the artists said. This, even though the surreal, urgent film addresses the pitfalls and seductive pull of a consumerist society. Its dystopian tale is about a world where kissing is considered a perverted crime, and slapping a person across the face serves as currency. In one memorable scene, characters use make-up to paint dark bruises on their cheeks to give the appearance of wealth and status.

Luàna Bajrami in Two People Exchanging Saliva (2024). Photo courtesy of Misia Films.

“We were surprised by how open both Galleries Lafayette and Chanel [which provided costumes] were to a film that, if not outright criticizes consumerist culture, then is at least ambiguous about it,” said Singh and Musteata in a text message. In the film, “we see how much class distinctions are exacerbated and put on display through clothing and the ritualized act of purchasing it.”

“Read from out of the blue, the script could have frightened off some,” admitted Cécile Larrigaldie, Galeries Lafayette’s director of cultural engagement, remembering her first reaction to the selected project. She spoke to me in a room perched atop the store’s Art Nouveau, 19th-century Paris flagship, stacked with decades of archives. Knowing the artistic duo and Singh’s thoughtful practice, however, helped Larrigaldie overcome her doubts.

Asked why she hadn’t been frightened off by the script, she turned to look straight at me: “It’s a carte blanche. When you are committed to art, you cannot start censoring it yourself. Otherwise, it’s not a commitment.”

Cécile Larrigaldie Director of Cultural Engagement, Culture – Patrimoine – Mécénat © Thibaut Voisin

Tapping the Art x Luxury Overlap

On that note, and under Larrigaldie’s direction, Galeries Lafayette is partnering for the first time with the Centre Pompidou-Metz to present an exhibition curated by Maurizio Cattelan and Chiara Parisi under the store’s glass dome on Boulevard Haussmann. Titled Pour Toujours (or Forever), it will feature works by Gloria Friedmann, Birgit Jürgenssen, Christodoulos Panayiotou, and Lawrence Weiner.

The Lafayette group’s president, Guillaume Houzé, also founded the Lafayette Anticipations foundation in 2012, a free-admission center for visual and performing arts in the Marais. While the family-owned brand has always supported and worked with artists, Larrigaldie said that thanks to Houzé, “we no longer need to justify the pertinence of associating creation and commerce… It makes my job a lot easier.”

Major art fairs are on the same page, by the looks of the more immersive, curated installations created by artist-brand partnerships, which increasingly complement traditional corporate sponsorships in and around events like Art Basel and Frieze. “If we’re aligned right, and if it serves the artists, the galleries, and us, as a brand, then I think it’s something that can be fostered, so long as it doesn’t take over what we do for our galleries,” said Art Basel Paris director Karim Crippa.

Another conference participant, Crippa noted the overlap of luxury shoppers with potential art collectors is nothing to sniff at. “The question is, how can we continue to grow together as a market?” he said. “Embracing these collaborations in a more open way may be one avenue allowing us to reach markets and resources that are still untapped.”

Artnet was the official media partner of the Art Business Conference, Paris.