Cars become art

A 40-metre addition to the skyline celebrates Mazda’s racing heritage at this year’s Goodwood Festival of Speed in England. Second in height only to Chichester Cathedral’s spire, it features two racing cars bursting out of the ground trailing twisted-steel shapes. Inspired by the marque’s Kodo design philosophy of strength, beauty and tension in the instantaneous movement of living things and the simplicity that reflects Japanese aesthetics, Gerry Judah’s interpretation of Kodo “is a beautiful form that expresses tension, lightness and movement that belies the complexity of the structure”. Andrew Clearwater, managing director of Mazda NZ, is attending the event in Sussex. He says: “It represents our brand through our design philosophy. There is a lightness and strength to the structure, yet it gives the cars movement and energy.” Stacked like matchsticks, 418 steel beams – each a different length and angle – turn the sculpture from right to left and hang the cars over spectators. It features 120 tonnes of steel that, put end to end, would stretch 1,235 metres. The central feature celebrates Mazda’s motorsport heritage, which started in Europe in the late 1960s to prove its rotary engine in endurance racing.

Since then, its rotary-engines cars have won 100 IMSA races, a class win in the Daytona 24 Hours, IMSA manufacturer and driver titles, the Spa 24 Hours, five class victories at Le Mans and two British Touring Car titles. The two cars on top of the sculpture are the Le Mans-winning 787B from 1991 driven by driver Johnny Herbert. Mazda remains the only Japanese marque to have won Le Mans and the only rotary engine to have won the famous 24-hour endurance event. Next to the 787B is the LM55 Vision Gran Turismo car, which was created for PlayStation’s Gran Tursimo 6 game. It’s named after the number-55 Mazda that won at Le Man, and is an homage to its dramatic proportions and a vision of a futuristic sports prototype.