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BMW celebrates 40 years of BMW Art Cars

By Swati Sanyal Tarafdar,

Added 27 May 2015

"Rolling Sculptures" take to the stage around the world in 2015

The group of seventeen artists who have designed BMW models so far since 1975 is very international, and interest in the "rolling sculptures" has spread all around the world. Several cars are usually on display at the BMW Museum in Munich, the home of the BMW Art Cars, as part of its permanent collection. The remaining BMW Art Cars are travelling the globe - to art fairs in Los Angeles, London and Hong Kong, as well as exhibitions at the Louvre, the Guggenheim and the Museum of Contemporary Art Shanghai.

To date, many of the BMW Art Cars have not only turned heads in museums, but have also - in their earlier life - done so on the race track:

Alexander Calder (BMW 3.0 CSL, 1975), Frank Stella (BMW 3.0 CSL, 1976), Roy Lichtenstein (BMW 320 Group 5, 1977), Andy Warhol (BMW M1 Group 4, 1979), Ernst Fuchs (BMW 635CSi, 1982), Robert Rauschenberg (BMW 635CSi, 1986), Michael Jagamara Nelson (BMW M3 Group A, 1989), Ken Done (BMW M3 Group A, 1989), Matazo Kayama (BMW 535i, 1990), César Manrique (BMW 730i, 1990), A. R. Penck (BMW Z1, 1991), Esther Mahlangu (BMW 525i, 1991), Sandro Chia (BMW M3 GTR, 1992), David Hockney (BMW 850CSi, 1995), Jenny Holzer (BMW V12 LMR, 1999), Ólafur Elíasson (BMW H2R, 2007) and Jeff Koons (BMW M3 GT2, 2010).

The BMW Group would also like to introduce the 40th anniversary of the BMW Art Car Collection into the public sphere through social media. While exploring the vision of each artist for their car on its social media channels, the company also wants to ask people what the ‘art of the car' means to them. To track the content, it will be shared under the hashtag #BMWArtCar.

In 2014, Hatje Cantz published the first comprehensive publication on the BMW Art Cars. The 200-page book is richly illustrated and reviews the history of this extraordinary collection of cars from its beginnings in 1975. It uses portraits and interviews to shed more light on the various artists' themes and approaches.

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