How Ken Done’s BMW Art Car came to be

To learn more, we’ve got to hop in the DeLorean and head back to 1989 – the year Ken Done’s BMW Art Car was revealed to the world.

Best known for his vivid paintings of all things Australiana (it was basically a national rite of passage in the ’80s and ’90s to wear a souvenir t-shirt with one of his designs on it), Done was approached by BMW HQ in the late ’80s to see if he’d be keen to join the ranks of Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein and other legendary artists whose work had graced previous racing cars. He was up to the challenge – but only if his signature Aussie twist could be incorporated into the design.

Done’s canvas wasn’t fresh off the production line. Rather, it was the M3 that Jim Richards drove to victory in the Australian Group A Driver’s Championship in 1987. When the car was withdrawn from competition a year later, Done spent just three days in his Sydney studio transforming it into a hybrid of a parrotfish and an actual parrot. “Both are beautiful and move at fantastic speeds,” Done said at the time. “I wanted to express this with the BMW Art Car.” With its vibrant tropical colours, and fins that blend into feathers that blend into racing stripes, the car looks like it’s in motion even when the handbrake’s on.

Since 1975, when the French racing car driver and auctioneer Hervé Poulain commissioned the American artist Alexander Calder to paint the first BMW Art Car, just a handful of artists around the world have been invited to design one. Done’s peers on the roster include John Baldessari, Jeff Koons, Jenny Holzer and David Hockney. Done did something none of the others attempted, though: he worked the car’s rims and wheel covers into his final design.

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