Press Release
Audi provides the inspiration for a giant automobile sculpture
Germany. Land of the car. Berlin gets mobile
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"The Automobile" sculpture unveiled in front of Brandenburg Gate
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How a 2.5:1 scale model of a series production car takes shape
Presiding in front of the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin is a gold and silver coloured object: 10.20 metres long, 3.25 metres high and 4.50 metres wide. On April 6, the square in front of the Gate – "Platz des 18. März" – became the arena for an unusual spectacle: the unveiling of a unique, oversized automobile sculpture built to a scale of 2.5:1 and inspired by Audi. A symbol for the innovative flair of German engineering and of Germany itself, the land of ideas. Audi is an official partner of the "Land of Ideas" initiative that has been launched to coincide with the Football World Cup. The giant sculpture "The Automobile" is the third of a total of six monuments which are due to be erected in the centre of Berlin and together make up the "Walk of Ideas", a sculpture park that forms one of the central elements of the "Germany - Land of Ideas" initiative. The unveiling was nothing less than spectacular, but the story behind it and the sculpture itself are no less sensational.
What sets the automobile sculpture apart from the other five? For one thing, the design for the extra-large "The Automobile" is the work of Audi's own design department. "The automobile is Germany's darling and most important export article," comments Claus Potthoff, Head of Exterior Design at Audi who oversaw the sculpture design process. The other distinguishing feature is the time reference. Whereas the other extra-large sculptures in the "Walk of Ideas" depict subjects taken from the past, the sculpture from Audi looks ahead to the future. "We quite deliberately chose a brand new model and portrayed our new styling line with the single-frame grille, without losing sight of cherished past values in the process," continues Potthoff. "An icon such as the original Audi TT must be treated with dignity but at the same time injected with new allure." The automobile sculpture captures the spirit of the "Walk of Ideas" by fusing uniquely innovative concepts from the past that have stood the test of time with groundbreaking new ideas for the future of the automotive industry.
The sculpture was actually modelled on the new Audi TT. Why this particular model? "For a sculpture on this scale, the Audi TT is simply the right car at the right time. Even without the logo, it is instantly recognisable. The TT is the car that children find it easiest to draw," replies Potthoff. "Its emblematic nature forms the ideal basis for a sculpture of this magnitude." The extraordinary dimensions posed the greatest challenge for the design team. In the case of series-production cars, three-dimensional 1: 4 scale models are normally made to obtain a feeling for the overall impression of the new Audi. "For this sculpture, the proportions were the other way around – we had to enlarge the series-production model by a factor of 2.5, without being able to know what the sculpture's overall effect would be," explains Potthoff. "Just the shoulder line is a whole two metres above the floor, meaning that a person of average height can't even quickly press their nose up against the window," he goes on to say. With the sculpture weighing in at just under ten tonnes, the wheels were truncated to spread the immense weight pressing down on them.
The automobile sculpture retains the style of the other models in Berlin as far as the colour scheme, the material and the clarity of its lines are concerned, but it is somehow different nonetheless. "'The Automobile" is realistic, less abstract – basically, it is the standard product in extra-large," remarks Uwe Schäfer, Technical Project Manager at EDAG Engineering + Design AG, the firm that secured the contract for manufacturing all of the sculptures for this initiative which was decided by public competition. Why is this? "The enormous sculptures had to be subdivided into segments for the manufacturing process. Consequently, artistic joins without any bearing to reality had to be created for all of the other sculptures; Audi, however, only used natural joins."
Potthoff confirms this, saying, "The practical joins in the series-production model were reproduced in exactly the same position in the sculpture." Details such as the door handles or the tank cap were omitted, but the characteristic flow of the lines can easily be recognised.
And where did all this begin? After just two weeks of work on the computer, the Audi designers were able to supply the shell, consisting of the basic exterior dimensions, to EDAG. Taking the surfaces of the series-production vehicle as a basis, different variants were simulated to determine the degree of abstraction. In order to gain an impression of the proportions and the level of detail required, photorealistic images were produced including people and the Brandenburg Gate to give a sense of scale.
At the headquarters of EDAG in the German town of Fulda, production shops normally used for body manufacture were completely cleared to make room for building the giant plastic sculptures. The same material was used for each of the six oversized sculptures: Neopor, a new type of plastic compound developed by BASF AG. Normally destined for thermal insulation of homes, this material serves as the filler for the sculpture. Equipped with the exterior data supplied by Audi, the design engineers at EDAG then got to work on the sculpture's "interior". This was a particularly daunting task, as Uwe Schäfer describes: "We had to find ways of making it possible to assemble, paint, produce and handle the sculpture, all within a very tight schedule." The manufacturing process for 'The Automobile' was the fastest, taking just two months from start to finish.
The milling machine was programmed based on the design data. 120 cubic metres of Neopor foam went into making the 16 individual parts which the milling machine's capacity and dimensions required the sculpture to be divided into. Each of the individual segments was milled from huge, grey blocks of Neopor measuring 5 metres long, 1 metre wide and up to 1.20 metres in height. Alexander Schäfer, who was in charge of constructing the automobile sculpture, explains: "The segments were constructed from the outside in. This defined the constructed space for the stress analyst; the main supporting frame was designed based on the calculated load data." This frame is located in the interior of the sculpture's body and forms the framework to which the auxiliary supporting frames will later be bolted. In this way, 16 shell-type segments are ultimately turned into a form – the form of the automobile. However, there are many more steps to be carried out first before the sculpture reaches completion.
