To be able to go over this question we must first have a definition of “art” itself. The definition of art is mainly personal will vary between individuals to a degree to be certain. There is some consensus though. “Art” includes a deliberate action that is supposed to evoke an emotional or sensual reaction, or supposed to convey a message from the founder. It is a medium in which individuals can express themselves, and may truly be anything in any way. The variables defining “art” exist more in the motives for doing something than the actual concrete outcome of such an action. This is because the motivation of the artist is what will ultimately determine the effectiveness of the work’s effects on others.
That being said, I would need to argue that there is a possibility of “art” in any area, which needs human creativity. When you look at a prestige car, or any car for that matter, you want to understand that every little bit of it had been made by people, everything from the headlights and the entire body of the vehicle, to leather car seats, the dash, and even every tiny screw and bolt holding the car together. There is a blank canvass in each and every facet of a vehicle, but as I mentioned before “artwork” is rooted in the inspiration of the founder, so I would definitely look at every car a work of “art”.
Many conventional styles of “art” have taken to the topic of automobiles. Finding the proportions and details of the vehicle, design, nature, and landscape just right in addition to the design of the painting itself and the colours used to make it are all big elements, which make this painting his work of “art”. On the next level there’s the car, a Ferrari 250 GTO, which is a complete masterpiece unto itself in every aspect of visual design and palaces, the perceptible symphony that its V12 creates under control, and ultimately the experience and senses it provides anyone who gets behind the wheel to drive it. There is also much “art” from the design of the steel bull bars to the natural beauty in the painting but my focus is on automotive artwork here so I will not digress.
Many cars are “art” all in their own though. Designers often use natural contours as inspiration for their own designs. Some of the prettiest cars are motivated by “the curves of a voluptuous woman” and can catch some of that alluring charm. It can be well argued that the feminine form is the foundation for much of what is considered “art”, so it is reasonable that automobile designers would follow that trend. Irrespective of the inspiration, many cars out there were created with somebody’s passion and imagination, and several of them make quite a statement when beheld from the eyes.
Aside from design how a car sounds is just another kind of an art form inside an automobile. The sound of a well breathing, fine tuned engine will send shivers down your back and shake you in an aural bliss, which will leave you craving for more. The most unique element of this “art of a vehicle is the effect a excellent car can have on the motorist. I call this aspect a cars “lively feel”, but in plain terms it is the way a car feels when you push it and how makes you feel in return. Some cars just fill the motorist with delight, some help you unwind, and a few just put a smile on your face. If a car makes the driver feel great whatsoever then something was done right when it had been made. There’s a good deal of really nerdy technical gibberish in “the way” engineers produce the energetic feel of a vehicle, but in the long run it only matters that it is there for many people.
Finally when a car was completed and hits the street, it becomes one complete entity composed of everything that went into it, down to every aspect — even the tjm hilux bullbar. In the best cars, the complete entity is art. Now this may be achieved by all of the bits being made as artwork by their founders and adding up to a complete, but the majority of the time genuinely great cars are seen as the whole from the start and are made out of the complete thing in mind and less pieces to be inserted. Many such cars are said to “have a soul” by their founders and many who encounter them since there comes a certain degree in which a vehicle can feel alive to the motorist, not unlike a horse really. Artful cars are all about the symbiosis of man and machine, and not only about basic transportation. So when considering a car think of its function as a machine, and if it is more than just art.
