For every Ferrari that spends its life pampered as a garage queen, there is almost always one that isn’t afraid to get its hands dirty – especially when Swiss photographer Fabian Oefner is calling the shots.
Oefner is no stranger to automotive art and one of his most recent projects, State of the Art, is nothing short of stunning. Armed with glow-in-the-dark UV paint, Ferrari graciously (and bravely) let Oefner blast a California T with an array of colours.
Fabian Oefner’s State of the Art project, featuring the Ferrari California T.
Supplied, Fabian Oefner
“When you think of a Ferrari, you think about beautiful design,” Oefner told Wired. “But you also think about speed and I wanted to find a way to visualize both things.”
And visualize it he did. The shoot took place over three days in a darkened wind tunnel at Ferrari’s headquarters in Maranello, Italy. Oefner and his team waited until wind speeds reached 105 mph before letting the paint loose, streaming across the California’s sheet metal and somehow making the car more beautiful than it already is. Oefner says he used up almost 30 gallons of red, yellow and blue UV paint, which were further accented by coloured UV lights.
Fabian Oefner’s State of the Art project, featuring the Ferrari California T.
Supplied, Fabian Oefner
To gain the visual effects he sought, Oefner used garden pumps and hoses perforated with small holes, sending the colours all over the car. Some hoses were even rigged to scaffolding to ensure the entire car was coated. The most difficult part, however, was the clean up – for every shot, Oefner and his team had to clean the Ferrari from top to bottom, a process that took up to an hour in some cases.
Of course, that effort was completely worth it. Check out the shots in the gallery and in Oefner’s video below.
