Art Is Motion

Background

The Lexus IS 300h was a luxury car that looked forward to the future with its hybrid technology, combining a 2.5-litre petrol engine with a high-output electric motor delivering high performance but at a claimed 67.5mpg.

A campaign was required to launch the car in Belgium based on the global concept of 'Amazing in Motion'. As well as boosting the Lexus' image among its cosmopolitan core target group, the idea also needed to have talkability.

Idea

In a world first, Lexus equipped one of its IS 300 h's with software which produced a 'generative self-portrait' of the driver. Based on the work of artist Sergio Albiac, the software converted all the driver's instructions to the car into paint-brush strokes. As the car proceeded, so a digital portrait of its owner took shape in real-time both on the inboard computer screen and on the Art is Motion website.

The more the driver relied on battery power rather than petrol, the more precise (and realistic) was the image created. The harder and faster he drove, the more violent the colours and the more impressionistic the portrait.

The campaign was launched by fitting the software to the Lexus 300h belonging to entrepreneur and art collector Walter Vanhaerents, who was known in Belgium as a champion of unconventional artists and a disruptive thinker in the art world.

After the launch, the car was auctioned on the artismotion.com website with a top bid of €45,000

Results

Early results are:

• Record number of visits to the Lexus website, where people stayed for an average of 6 min. 80% of the visits were for the IS 300h.
• 34% more test drive requests compared to the launch of the previous IS model.
• 350 cars were sold in the early phases of the campaign against an objective of 290 for the whole year.
• The campaign made the news both online and offline.
• 10,400,000 people were reached via social media.
• Lexus International began looking into developing the idea as an official feature for future cars.

Our Thoughts

In all the PR surrounding the launch of this campaign, I was interested in the statement from Karen Corrigan, CEO of Happiness Brussels. She said, “It is the role of great creative agencies to add game-changing value to their client’s businesses by innovating new products & services.” I couldn’t agree more.

All too often, though, it is the charity sector which encourages agencies to innovate while commercial clients stand and watch. Full credit then to Lexus Belgium for trying something different.

I’d be interested to see whether the original car gets auctioned from the website at a significant premium to a standard showroom car. In a way, it has become a work of art in its own right while providing the ‘canvas’ for a host of original Albiacs.