Imagination & The Great masters

A Museum Study Tour for Founders, Investors, and Senior Leaders

Using the close study of masterworks to sharpen perception, judgement, and strategic thinking

May 16 - 17, 2026  ~ The National Gallery, London

Join the Leo Marchutz School of Painting & Drawing in London, England, Saturday, May 16th and Sunday, May 17th for a museum study seminar specifically for founders, investors, and senior leaders. Read on for more details and instructions on how to register.

Details

Dates: May 16-17, 2026 | Location: London, England | Led By: Alan Roberts and Caitlin Scheybeler

Price: $1,250 | Maximum Enrollment: 12 students (first-come, first-served)

The close study of great works of art offers a powerful model for holistic leadership thinking. By comparing masterworks, leaders see how artists integrate vision, structure, and intuition to create something enduring. In front of a masterpiece, imagination becomes visible — revealing how bold ideas are shaped, tensions resolved, and disparate elements brought into harmony. We invite founders, investors, and senior leaders to join our two-day Museum Study Seminar, an immersive experience designed to sharpen perception and elevate leadership insight. It is our experience that art not only inspires leaders; art is a laboratory for leadership cognition.

If you would like to share this opportunity with your community, a PDF flyer is available here.

Inclusions

Cost for the program is £1000 per person. This includes all gallery sessions, opening lunch, and closing dinner. Participants must arrange their own travel and accommodation. Participants may bring up to one guest for an additional £400.

Testimonial

“The museum tour experience fundamentally changed how I approach complex leadership problems. 

“At the time I attended I was the turnaround CEO of a distressed public company. Critical to the turnaround was converting a huge legacy code base and enterprise license sales model into a more efficient and market-ready SaaS model. I had inherited a skilled but very set in their ways management team that was resistant to the dramatic changes needed to regain competitiveness.

“Listening to Alan it became abundantly clear that the detailed artistic process, each stroke building on the next, of breathing life into a vision expressed on canvas was exactly the same as the challenge I faced. 

“When I returned, I spent two weeks speaking with every individual contributor in the company, bypassing their managers. I discovered that people across the organisation were ready for change - it was the managers who were the obstacle. I removed the problem, and within three quarters we were in the market with a new product, a new sales model, and a new management team. 

“I used the skills I learned that weekend productively for the rest of my career.”

- William Santo, Technology Entrepreneur and CEO

About the Program

Enhancing Imagination: A Museum Experience for Strategic Thinkers 

In today’s fast-paced economy, competitive advantage demands both digital fluency and deep empathy, using technology to enhance rather than just replace human work. For today’s most effective leaders, success depends on Baudelaire’s constructive imagination - the ability to synthesise complexity, align systems, and transform innovation into culture, meaning, and brand. Like any living organisation, a company thrives only when its parts are unified into a coherent whole. 

The close study of great works of art offers a powerful model for this kind of leadership thinking. By comparing masterworks, leaders see how artists integrate vision, structure, and intuition to create something enduring. In front of a masterpiece, imagination becomes visible - revealing how bold ideas are shaped, tensions resolved, and disparate elements brought into harmony. 

We have seen paintings by Van Gogh and Rembrandt, African masks, and Hiroshige prints spark moments of strategic insight among senior leaders, especially through guided observation and peer dialogue. In the museum, leaders step outside operational urgency and engage in reflective, integrative thinking - the very imagination that binds organisations together. 

We invite founders, investors, and senior leaders to join our two-day Museum Study Seminar, an immersive experience designed to sharpen perception and elevate leadership insight. It is our experience that art not only inspires leaders; art is a laboratory for leadership cognition.

Program Outcomes

Participants will leave with:

• Greater strategic imagination: seeing beyond what already exists

• Enhanced ability to recognise patterns and synthesise complexity

• Improved capacity for systems thinking: understanding relationships between parts and whole

• Increased ability to bring vision into clear and coherent form

• Strengthened judgement and clarity in decision-making

Program Format

This program is limited to a small group of participants to allow for sustained observation, dialogue, and individual attention.

Working together inside the museum, participants engage directly with selected masterworks over extended periods of time. The emphasis is on careful looking, thoughtful discussion, and the gradual development of  perception.

The program begins with an opening lunch and concludes with a final dinner and closing conversation.

Program Facilitators

Alan Roberts 

Alan is an artist whose studio has been located at the renowned Châteaunoir, situated on the Route de Cézanne in Aix-en-Provence, since 1977. 

Having studied under Leo Marchutz, Alan began teaching art history in 1982 and is now Artistic Director of the Leo Marchutz School of Painting and Drawing where he teaches drawing, painting, and aesthetics. Alan’s international exhibition record includes the Musée Granet in Aix-en-Provence as well as galleries in the U.S. and France. He has exhibited with such artists as Romare Bearden, Sam Francis, Helen Frankenthaler, Wolfe Kahn, Roy Lichtenstein, Robert Motherwell, and Paul Cézanne. He has also collaborated on several important books concerning the art of Leo Marchutz and his students. 

Alan has a BS in Psychology from the University of South Carolina and an MFA from The Vermont College of Fine Arts. He is fluent in French and English.

Caitlin Scheybeler

Caitlin works with founders, investors, and leadership teams to support clarity, alignment, and effective decision-making in complex environments. Her background spans venture capital, leadership advisory, and counselling psychology, with a particular focus on how leaders perceive, interpret, and act under conditions of uncertainty.

In this programme, she supports participants in integrating the museum study experience with their own leadership and organisational challenges.

Program Itinerary

Saturday, May 16th

11:30-12:30 - Introduction to Program
12:30-14:00 - Opening Lunch
14:30-17:30 - In the National Gallery: Titian, Tintoretto, and Rembrandt

Sunday, May 17th

9:30 - Meet at Entrance of the National Gallery
10:00-12:30 - In the National Gallery: Guardi, Constable, and Turner
12:30-14:00 - Lunch Break
14:00-17:30 - In the National Gallery: Van Gogh, Cezanne, and Monet
19:00 - Final Dinner and Closing Discussion

Registration Instructions

Please complete the registration form below to enroll in the program. Please note your enrollment is not considered final until you have paid for the program in full.

The Leo Marchutz School does not discriminate in any way on the basis of race, color, age, background, sexual orientation, sex, gender identity, religion, disability, veteran status, genetic information, or national or ethnic origin, and admits students/participants of any race, color, age, background, sexual orientation, sex, gender identity, religion, disability, veteran status, genetic information, or national or ethnic origin.

Refund Policy

• If a participant cancels before May 1, 2026, they will be refunded the full program fee.

• If a participant cancels between May 1 and May 9, 2026 (inclusive), they will be refunded any recoverable fees, less a £500 administrative fee.

• If a participant cancels after May 9, 2026, no refund will be given.

Questions?

Please reach out to us at info@leomarchutzschool.org with any questions regarding this program. We look forward to hearing from you!