While sat in the customer suite at Ocean BMW, Paignton, I was perusing the latest BMW magazine and came across an interesting article on the BMW Art Car. Periodically, BMW commission someone to create a work of art on one of their iconic vehicles. The very first was created by Roy Lichtenstein back in 1977. The latest incarnation of the BMW Art Car was created by Jeff Koons, who is renowned for creating iconic structures and images. The vehicle used was a BMW M3 GT2 and was raced at the Le Mans 24 hour race back in June 2010. As you will see from the images and video below, Jeff has worked his magic and yet again created a very strong statement. The artwork is said to symbolise bursting energy, motion and power and in his own words “These race cars are like life, they are powerful and there is a lot of energy, you can participate with it, add to it and let yourself transcend with its energy. There is a lot of power under that hood and I want to let my ideas transcend with the car – it’s really to connect with that power.” Timing was a big issue, as there was only a two month window between the first design sketches and the Paris world premiere. This is why digital print on car wrapping vinyl was used covered by a double clear-coating to bring out the colour. To apply hundreds of dynamic lines of Koons’ design onto the car, CAD designs were translated from 3D into 2D for the printing process and then painstakingly applied to the entire car as well as onto individual spare parts. Not sure I will be doing the same to my BMW any time soon though.

Article by: Paul Mabin – Managing Director

After doing some recent research for one of our clients, I came across some advertising produced for BMW. Believe it or not, these adverts were actually used, but mainly in Greece. I’m not sure that we would get away with them in the UK. If you dig deeper into these campaigns and read forums and blogs, they have been causing outrage and controversy for years, with claims that they are ‘demeaning’, ‘sexist’, ‘chauvinistic’ and ‘degrading’. However, whether we like them or not, BMW must be having the last laugh. The very fact that people are talking about these adverts all over the world, whether in a good light or bad, can only be more publicity for BMW. As the old adage goes, their is no such thing as bad publicity – however, not quite sure BP would agree with that statement at the moment.

Opinion – Paul Mabin (Creative Director / Managing Director)