Aurélien Bosc as president of Culturespaces

Paris. Bruno Monnier, the president of Culturespaces, a private cultural operator that he founded in 1990, is handing over his chair to Aurélien Bosc, president of Pathé Cinémas until May 2024. However, he remains a shareholder in the company and will chair the board of directors. monitoring. Aurélien Bosc’s profile echoes the profound change in Culturespaces’ economic model. He began his professional career as a consultant in a large consulting firm (Ernst & Young) before having a brief stint in the financial management of the Carrefour group then joining Pathé in 2018. A profile that suits both new shareholders of Culturespaces and the transformation of its activities. Majority-owned by the Engie group, the company was bought in 2022 by two investment funds: IDI and Chevrillon (the latter also took a stake in 2023 in the Drouot auction house).

At the same time, Culturespaces continued its disengagement, freely or constrained (but most often constrained), from heritage sites in favor of its activities known as “immersive art centers”. After losing the management of the Ephrussi (Saint-Jean-Cap-Ferrat) and Kérylos (Beaulieu-sur-Mer) villas, then the three sites in Nîmes (including the Maison Carrée), he is entangled in an endless lawsuit concerning the management of the Château des Baux-de-Provence and the nearby Carrières des Lumières.

The castle has disappeared from its portfolio of sites, and the future of Quarry management today depends on justice. Bruno Monnier was also sentenced to six months in prison for concealment of favoritism in this affair. Culturespaces had for a time managed the exhibitions at the Maillol Museum in Paris (from 2015 to 2020) before Olivier Lorquin, its director, turned to the company Tempora. A pioneer in its sector, Culturespaces has gradually seen the emergence of more and more serious competitors: Kléber-Rossillon, Tempora, Edeis… Today, Culturespaces no longer has these nuggets that are the Jacquemart-André Museum in Paris (which belongs to the Academy of Fine Arts) and the Hôtel de Caumont, in Aix-en-Provence, which he owns.

This disengagement can also be explained by the phenomenal success of “digital art centers” in France and around the world. Culturespaces now has nine, with different management models. This network allows it to amortize the costs of designing immersive exhibitions and to run them in its different locations. The financial margins are much higher in this activity than in the management of heritage places. Culturespaces generated a profit of 2.5 million euros in 2021 and 2022 for a turnover of almost 50 million euros in 2022. No wonder the company is attracting the interest of investment funds. In principle, they are supposed to maximize profitability by opening other immersive centers, before reselling their shares by 2027/2029, hoping to pocket a comfortable capital gain in the process.

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