richard phillips and porsche express a vibrant new environment with the electric taycan art car

a vibrant collaboration with richard phillips sees the porsche taycan 4S ‘queen of the night’ art car, a distinctive chapter for the company’s first all-electric sports car. as phillips’ 2010 painting is itself a large-scale homage to a still life by the great swiss artist adolf dietrich, it is fitting that the sale of this special porsche will benefit the swiss non-profit organization suisseculture sociale. proceeds of the sale will aid creatives impacted by the covid-19 pandemic — adding another dimension to the already compelling collaborative project. the ‘queen of the night’ art car will auction from april 6th until 13th at RM sotheby’s.

2020 porsche taycan 4S art car by richard phillips | andrea klainguti © 2021 courtesy of RM sotheby’s

new york city-based artist richard phillips collaborates with porsche schweiz AG to create the one-of-one ‘queen of the night’ art car which will auction in april at RM sotheby’s. in the context of the ongoing pandemic, and the canvas of the all-electric porsche taycan 4S, the artist sought to express a language of sustainability and environmental awareness. the process of creating the art car was more than a matter of simply transferring the painting to the porsche’s three-dimensional form. phillips comments: ‘the first sketches that I made were literally a still life on top of a car… which was a bit too still. I had to re-think that idea and take the elements of the still life, take them apart, and make them become elements that could flow across the contours of the car, to show speed.’

with a design finalized, even the execution of richard phillips’ porsche taycan 4S artcar became a work of performance art. the painting was transferred onto to the car’s body within the leuehof pop-up restaurant on zürich’s famous bahnhofstrasse, which was forced to close due to the pandemic. the artist supervised, remotely of course, as germany’s signal design crafted the final product. phillips notes the process: ‘they were making judgement calls and sending me pictures. it was really a fascinating, hand-made process. it was sculpting and painting at the same time, digitally and virtually.’ the resulting art car expresses a vibrant night-blooming cactus and sky-blue patches replete with butterflies that establish a sense of motion, even when the car is standing still.

project info:

project title: ‘queen of the night’ 2020 porsche taycan 4S art car

artist: richard phillips | @richardfphillips

collaborator: porsche schweiz AG | @porsche.ch

wrapping: signal design | @signal_wrapping

auction: april 6th — 13th at RM sotheby’s here

photography: andrea klainguti © 2021 courtesy of RM sotheby’s