BMW has always been an auto brand I've admired. They've been putting out great-looking, high-performance vehicles since I was a kid. One of my early favs was the Beemer 2002. Growing up in Scarsdale, NY, my buddy Jim drove one in high school. I'll never forget it.
As I got older I not only admired the cars but the marketing campaigns behind them. If you hear the expression "The Ultimate Driving Machine" it can only mean BMW. They have also been early adopters in the digital age. The BMW film series ran online only back in 2000-2001. It was widely acclaimed and probably helped sell a few cars, too.
BMW continues to impress me with their involvement in the art world. Their relationship with art and artists dates back to 1975 when french car racer Herve' Poulain asked his friend, Alexander Calder, to use his BMW race car as a canvas. Calder created the masterpiece below and BMW Art Car was born.
Since then BMW has commissioned 16 world renowned artists to put their own unique brush strokes on a BMW. Now the BMW Art Car World Tour is making its rounds in the states and I was fortunate to get a viewing in NYC at Vanderbilt Hall in Grand Central Terminal last week. It's quite something to see an original Warhol, Lichtenstein and Rauschenberg on wheels. A painting by any of these artists sells in the millions. I can only imagine the value of the vehicles.
To make the Tour even more interesting this year BMW created its own artwork by using the wheels of a Z4 Roadster as paintbrushes and driving it across an enormous 100 x 200 foot "canvas." Think of it as BMW's own version of a Jackson Pollack painting. I was fascinated with the outcome.
For more information go to: www.expressionofjoy.com. Great to see behind-the-scenes footage of how this artwork was created, hear from the artist himself, and see the finished product. To keep me even more engaged in the online version and add a little fun/creativity it would have been interesting to allow the user to create their own versions on a blank canvas. Turn the cursor into a Z4 and let me be the next great artist!
