BMW’s Art Car Collection Embarking On World Tour

BMW’s famed Art Car Collection is about to begin its world tour of museums. The tour kicks off on September 14 when an installation of the cars is unveiled at the Gallery Petronas in Kuala Lumpur, Malasia. The cars will remain there until October 22, at which point they will go on display in Singapore, the Phillipines, and Korea, before heading Down Under.

The cars will continue to make their international rounds until at least 2010, at which point they’ll have made it through Africa, Russia, India, Turkey, and the US, among others.

The collection features a range of different models painted by famed artists like Andy Warhol, Frank Stella, and Roy Lichtenstein.

(Click through for more pictures of BMW’s Art Car Collection, and the press release)

THE BMW ART CAR WORLD TOUR KICKS OFF IN KUALA LUMPUR
09/07/2006

Malaysia is the first station for the international museum exhibiton about “rolling sculptures”.

Munich / Kuala Lumpur. On September 14, 2006, the unique BMW Art Car Collection will start its world tour through international museums worldwide. BMW cars designed by artists like Frank Stella (1976), Roy Lichtenstein (1977), Andy Warhol (1979), und Ken Done (1989) will be presented in the Gallery Petronas in Kuala Lumpur / Malaysia from September 14 until October 22, 2006.

Afterwards the “rolling sculptures” will travel to Singapore, to the Philippines in the Ayala Museum of Manila and the Artsonje Museum in Seoul, Korea. The travel will continue to the Art Gallery New South Wales in Sydney, Australia and the Te Papa Museum Auckland of New Zealand, before India’s capital Delhi will firstly be the last stop for Done, Lichtenstein, Stella and Warhol.

In a parallel tour the BMW Art Cars of Alexander Calder (1975), Matazo Kayama (1990), David Hockney (1995), and Jenny Holzer (1999) will be exhibited throughout Taiwan, China, Russia and Africa. Stops are the National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts in Taichung, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Shanghai, the Long March Space in Beijing, the La Villa des Arts in Casablanca as well as the Central Exhibition Hall Manege in Moscow.

Subsequent to these tours through Malaysia, Australia, New Zealand, Taiwan, the Philippines, Korea, China, Africa, Russia and India the treasures of the BMW Art Car Collection will be exhibited between 2007 and 2010 in museums in Turkey and the US before they return to Europe. France, Spain and Portugal have started close cooperations with museums.
The BMW Art Car Collection

Since 1975, outstanding artists from all over the world have been designing the BMW automobiles of their era. The 15 exhibits which have thus far been presented in the BMW Art Car Collection include works by well-known artists such as Frank Stella, Roy Lichtenstein, Andy Warhol, A.R. Penck, David Hockney and Jenny Holzer. The Art Cars reflect the developments in art history with regard to fine art, design and technology and are displayed worldwide in major museums such as the Paris Louvre, the Royal Academy in London, the New York Whitney Museum of Modern Art, Venice’s Palazzo Grassi, Sydney’s Powerhouse Museum and the Guggenheim Museums of New York and Bilbao. In the future, too, Art Cars will document the fascinating link between art and technology in international exhibitions.