The French racecar driver Hervé Poulain initiated the BMW Art Car project in 1975. This is the project that let artists to express his or her idea of automobile. Poulain commissioned American artist Alexander Calder to be a first artist to create BMW Art Car.
Born in 1898 in Pennsylvania, best known for his kinetic sculptures. Calder described his art theory as “Disparity that exists between form, masses and movement”. Calder was ideal artist to begin this BMW Art Car series, as he was well known for his works expressing color, shape and motion. Calder was introduced to Mondrian in 1930, when Calder visited Mondrian’s studio filled with abstract arts, Calder suggested to Mondrian:
“It would be fun to make these rectangles oscillate.”
Mondrian responded to Calder dismissively “No it is not necessary, my painting is already fast enough”. Calder came back to his studio and made his very first sculpture with motor power in 1931.
Marcel Duchamp termed his sculpture “Mobile” (kinetic sculptures hanging from a ceiling; by contrast, Calder’s stationary sculptures are called stabiles). Calder designed outside of BMW 3.0 CSL that equipped with 6 Cylinder inline engine, 4 Valves per cylinder, Twin overheard camshafts with top speed of 291km/h. In 1975 Same Posey, Jean Guichet and Hervé Poulain drove this BMW Art Car 3.0 CSL by Calder in the 24 Hours of Le Mans. This first BMW Art Car was also sadly Calder’s last work, as he died the same year.
