Can museums and luxury brands’ perceptions be compared? How a survey and semiotics help decipher the French collective psyche, relative to cultural and commercial identities

Abstract

AbstractMuseums and luxury brands are today getting more and more involved with each other, in their communications as in their activities. While brands are looking for a cultural recognition, museums need additional sources of funding and program events and exhibitions related to fashion creators. Obviously, luxury brands and museums share common values, as they belong to cultural identity. But to what extent can their collective psyche be compared? Are there common structures of imagery between brands and museums? These questions have been explored in research conducted in France. Combining semiotics with a quantitative method, it casts a new light on the question of social identities and their impact on the public. It reveals that brands and museums both present an embedded architecture of imagery, in which specific visual signs stand as metonymic embodiment. It also questions the notion of myth, as universal and archaic symbols appear to lay in both cultural and commercial representations.