The BMW 3.0 CSL, with which Alexander Calder laid the foundations of the Art Car Collection in 1975, was also one of the last works he produced before his death.
And it was an extraordinarily interesting work too: as a sculptor, Calder broke free from the formal restraints imposed by the sports car and drew his own unique artistic lines.
Like his sculptures and mobiles (so named by the French Dada artist Marcel Duchamp), he used powerful colors on attractive curving expanses, which spread liberally over the roof, hood and wings.
Calder's artwork was on show the very same year at the 24-hour race at Le Mans, an event which the artist attended.
Alexander Calder died November 11, 1976, in New York City, just after supervising the installation of his largest retrospective exhibition, at the Whitney Museum of American Art.
