The finished product will be unveiled at next year's 24 Hours of Le Mans.
BMW has announced that its next art car will be an M Hybrid V8 hypercar, which BMW will debut at the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 2024, and the creation will hurtle down the Mulsanne Straight as one of the factory racers; this won't be a basic static display.
The paint will be applied by New York-based Ethiopian American artist Julie Mehretu, who was unanimously chosen by “an international jury of museum directors and curators.” They must have plenty of faith in the artist's abilities because BMW says Mehretu “will be given total creative freedom.”
The collaboration was announced in the artist's hometown at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum.
“I've loved cars for most of my life, as toys, as objects, as possibilities,” said Mehretu. “It is from that space that I'm really excited to be working on the next BMW Art Car more than anything.
This will be the 20th BMW art car, and it brings the project full circle because the first such “rolling sculptures,” as BMW describes them, were created atop racing cars themselves. Interestingly, the first art car was not initiated by BMW. Rather, French racing driver Herve Poulain approached the automaker. BMW's public relations department had no plans for such a creation, but taking a chance on a wacky idea has now turned into a cultural phenomenon that has put BMW's name on the lips of people who don't even care about cars.
To create the first-ever BMW art car, American sculptor Alexander Calder was given a 1975 BMW 3.0 CSL Batmobile racecar to paint, and that very car was piloted by Poulain at the 24 Hours of Le Mans. That's the first art car, but what was the last?
Since 1975, we've seen several standout art cars, perhaps none more recognized than the world-famous BMW M1 painted by Andy Warhol. There's also been the BMW M3 GT2 painted by Jeff Koons and the BMW 5 Series customized by Esther Mahlangu, but the most recent was the 2016 M6 GTLM created by John Baldessari. You can see those cars in the gallery below.
As a side note, there is often some confusion about what constitutes a true art car. Sometimes, individual BMW outposts will create a one-off livery for a car as a marketing ploy, as was the case with a 7 Series Hybrid revealed by BMW Brazil in 2020. BMW has also allowed some upcoming artists to paint cars for the sake of art fairs and exhibitions, but the official art cars are always painted by world-renowned, award-winning artists with no limits or themes restricting their creations.
Keyword: M Hybrid V8 Hypercar Will Be A BMW Art Car Like No Other