Lexus cars become sculptures that look like works of artificial intelligence

Lexus has transformed two of its electrified models into sculptures that look like works of artificial intelligence. The pieces were commissioned from the Brooklyn-based conceptual collective MSCHF and form the Motomorphosis exhibition, open to the public in New York during Armory Week, a week that concentrates the city’s main contemporary art fairs.

The show displays two production cars alongside their deformed counterparts. The RZ 450e electric SUV reappears as a Circle Car, with the body curved in a loop that joins the front to the rear and suggests endless displacement.

The RX 450h+, a plug-in hybrid, gave rise to the Twisted Car, marked by a longitudinal torsion that stretches the lines of the bodywork along a spiral.

Shape cars, not concept cars

The MSCHF describes the works as form cars — shaped cars — as opposed to Concept Cars, the concept cars of the automakers. The inversion is deliberate: while an automobile is designed to move, the sculptures were shaped only to produce the idea of movement, without any mechanical function.

According to Lexus, the choice of the topic tries to shift the debate about electrification from the technical to the symbolic field. “Most conversations about electrification focus on how a vehicle is powered. Motomorphosis asks another question: what can electricity power in our imagination?” said Lisa McQueen, the brand’s senior marketing manager, in a statement.

Distortions of this type are recurrent in the work of the collective, known for transposing typical effects of the digital environment to the physical world. In the case of the show, the reference is the transition frames of 3D animations, in which the shapes stretch and compress according to movement.

Models are sold in Brazil

The two SUVs used in the project have equivalents in the Brazilian market. The RX 450h+ is sold here from R$ 614.990, according to dealership price lists. The RZ 450e did not arrive in the country: the national version of the electric is the RZ 500e, launched in May for R$ 499.990, with 381 hp and 53,8 kgfm combined.

Lexus informs that the examples on display are special project vehicles, modified with parts that are not from the brand, and warns that the changes may void the warranty, compromise safety and prevent use on public roads.