BMW 325i

BMW 325i - video projection with sound, 4 mins

The video features grainy, slowed-down CCTV-like footage a BMW 325i parked in front of the Bank of England in the City of London. A pedestrian carrying a briefcase slowly traverses the scene as the suspense builds.

BMW 325i was made shortly after the announcement of the IRA ceasefire in 1994. The backdrop of the Bank of England in the City of London and the corporate car of choice at the time (a BMW) suggests a link between power, finance and politics. The prospect of bombings had seemed ever-present in Britain and Northern Ireland during the artist's lifetime and the artist lived about a mile away from the City of London when it was hit by several large bombs in the early 1990s.

See below for development of film


	Rob Scholte’s BMW 325i - De Telegraaph November 1994		Golf Gti test. Peter Vlaminkstraat, Amsterdam. 1994 An early test version of this work used an exploding Golf Gti on an Amsterdam street. The final version depicted a BMW325i exploding outside the Bank of England in the financial district of London and was first exhibited at the Open Ateliers of the Amsterdam Rijsakademie in early December 1994. Coincidentally, while the work was being installed, the Dutch artist Rob Scholte was blown out of his BMW on an Amsterdam street. Scholte lost his legs in the explosion, which at the time was thought to be a case of mistaken identity, related to a court case involving drugs.
			Golf Gti - 1994. The backdrop to Golf Gti was the Lisson Gallery in London. This time the work was conceived as an act of virtual terrorism. The idea was to take a car from a particular street and film a similar car exploding in the same location. During a meeting with a curator at the Lisson gallery about his own work, Dower handed a copy of the tape over. The video sat on a shelf and it is not known if it was ever viewed by anyone at the gallery.
	Golf Gti. Still from unreleased video 1994

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