Jeff Koons and BMW Team Up to Make 99 BMW 8 Series Art Cars at $350,000 a ‘Pop’
Jeff Koons is one of the biggest names in the art world today. Being savvy in the marketing world, BMW decided to continue the next leg of the BMW Art Car program with a run of 2022 BMW 8 Series art cars designed by Jeff Koons with a very pop-art-inspired comic book motif. BMW and Koons are limiting production to only 99 examples at $350,995.
What is the BMW Art Car program?
BMW has done it again. The German sports sedan maker has long been interested in engaging with its customers through pop culture. The BMW Art Car program is one of the ways it does this.
Throughout the years, BMW has selected a prominent artist to design a livery for one of its models. This Koons car marks the 17th art car coming from this program. Some of the world’s most treasured artists have left their mark on the program, including Calder, Stella, Lichtenstein, Warhol, and more. This is Koons’ second Art Car for BMW; the first was the radical BMW e92 M3 Art Car that raced at the 24 hours of LeMans in 2010.
Although the Koons’ M3 might be a bit tough to get your hands on, the “8 X Jeff Koons” cars will be available for purchase. The first 99 people with $350,000 to blow will get a true BMW Art Car.
Meet the newest Art Car
The 8 X Jeff Koons are 2022 BMW M850i xDrive Gran Coupes re-designed by Koons in a heavily comic-book-inspired theme. The livery shows classic comic-book-art graphics that not only tip their hat to classic comic books but also to a former Art Car designer Roy Lichtenstein.
If the Pop Art references were at risk of being too subtle, Koons added a very on-the-nose- “POP!” across one of the rear quarter panels. According to MotorTrend, this livery requires 11 different stages of painting. These steps required several hundred hours of painting per vehicle.
Considering how many cars BMW is making, these cars are quite the commitment. When you consider that only two cars can be produced per week by two specialized teams at BMW’s Dingolfing and Landshut plants in Bavaria, Germany, you realize the $350,995 MSRP is more reasonable than you thought.
The interior is no less over the top. The seats have been covered in various colored leathers to represent Golden Age comic book heroes like Spiderman and Superman. There are some other smaller references to G.I. Joe as well. The rest of the non-referential upholstery is a lovely mix of wine red and saddle brown leather with red stitching.
How can you buy a Jeff Koons BMW?
The comic-themed Art Car is on sale as of February 16th. Even if you have the cash, buyers will still have to employ a bit of luck and call in favors to get one of the very limited cars.
However, if you want you don’t want to rely on luck and want your money to go to the International Center for Missing and Exploited Children (ICMEC), one will be going on the block during the Christie’s Auction on April 4, 2022, in New York City.
For those of us a few pennies shy of the $350k mark, an 8 X Jeff Koons will be on display at Rockefeller Plaza between April 1-4, 2022. The car will continue to travel the rest of the year to places like the 16th Istanbul Contemporary, Paris Photo, West Bund Art and Design Fair Shanghai, Art Basel Hong Kong, and the Goodwood Festival of Speed.
