events 2010

>  Retromobile Paris 2010
>  Le Mans 24 hours 2010
>  Goodwood Festival of Speed 2010
>  Le Mans Classic 2010
>  Silverstone Classic 2010
>  Goodwood Revival 2010
 

Retromobile Paris 2010



What a fantastic show. To be honest I did not like big cities before I started to exhibit at Paris in 2009 and now this year in 2010. But I fell in love with Paris now. This town, Audrey and her family, my friends, helpers and collectors and the visitors of Paris Retromobile have given me so much attention and respect about my art work, that I can only say "Merci mille fois !". It was just marvellous !!!
 
Where should I start? May be with the loading of my tiny Vivaro and the fact that Markus Höhnle, my dear friend nearly did not find a place for his luggage, as there was no 5 cm left empty in my transporter. Thanks to the cardboard and the canvas prints I surely was not overloaded in terms of weight, but look at the photo, and you know what I mean with completely loaded.
Markus and I arrived at the wednesday afternoon safe and sound in Paris and brought the van against all french opposition into the hall. Once unloaded we were off to Audreys home in Versailles. A real dream to be invited by her again for Markus and me together to sleep twelve nights in Audreys and Nicolas third room. Now I have learned riding the SNCF and Metro quite well, as Versailles means about a thirty minutes ride to Retromobile expo in the south west of Paris. So with a good sleep and a fight for a parking lot for good old (and much too large for parisian standards) Vivaro, we built up our 9 on 3 metres stand. I was very pleased with the pre-organisation. We even had electricity problems solved in minutes because of the brave technical staff there. The show opened its doors to press and VIPs on friday. This year I was of course not interviewed again by "Turbo", but we had a lot of visitors from magazines and companies concerning our idea of having an "motorsport artists street". With all my friends and motorsport artists from France and Belgium together we have founded Art Avenue, mostly for the idea to help each other over the twelve hard days of Retromobile. Benjamin Freudenthal (foto with guitar below) was our president last year and organised the stands and show preworks perfectly. Our new president, Francois Vanaret will organize it for 2011. Thanks to both !

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



Hervé Nys et femme, sculpturistes
 

Phillippe Burlet,
painter

 

 

 

 

 

 
Natacha Toutain,
painter of star portraits
 
Christophe Parodi (blue shirt),
painter
 
Francois Vanaret and wife,
painter
From day one the show was a success. We had a huge number of visitors and I especially had a lot of good customers coming back again. From various nations by the way. The main part was french, but evenly belgium, dutch, german, english, irish, american, czechy, austrian, australian and spanish could have been spoken at our stand, if we had been able to speak these languages and dialects. At day one I sold the Tyrannosaurus Rex original to an alsacian collector of my Le Mans art. He likes Le Mans as I do and fell in love with the Corvette C6R painting.
 




 
On the first day, the friday at Retromobile, we had a special event at my stand with the unveiling of my painting, that I did for the honour of Pierre "Levegh". This great man and character nearly won Le Mans 1952 in his Talbot, leading 23 hours alone at the wheel, impressing hundred thousands of french supporters and Alfred Neubauer, so he took him into the Mercedes team for 1955. The unhappy end is known quite well, but the latest film about the tragic accident shows Levegh as a victim of a high speed accident, rather than leaving him guilty in any kind. To emphasize his special character and his fight for victory at Le Mans I painted "So near – yet so far" for my friend and collector Joe Flay. Himself a Le Mans Connaisseur and collector. It was a great moment to show the painting there for the first time and it provocated a lot of discussions and questions at my stand (see the photo were a french journalist, a dutch collector and Joe Flay have a great talk). Good - as Levegh himself is a symbol for the two sides of motorsport. Nobody can deny its dangers - but nobody should forget its heroes too - and one of them was Pierre Levegh.
 




 
Over the following days I met again some very interesting people. There was this couple from France driving a Porsche 356 in red, just the one I had painted two years before, not knowing they would buy it as their wedding anniversary present on that january day in 2010. I was asked to personalize their original for them. At forst I did not know what they meant, but with some little details painted and a personal word signed on their original we all three had a wonderful moment (see photos please).
 




 
The next day I met Jaroslav Juhan, a race pilot and old friend of Hans Herrmann. He raced formerly in the 50s and 60s together with the likes of Herrmann, Fangio, Farina and Co. The stories he told were in his mind as if they had happened just days ago, but most of them belonged to the days ´when racing was wild and dangerous – some 50 to 60 years ago. The time has formed great characters. That´s how Juhan appeared to me too. His stories about the Panamericana e.g. will stay in my mind for some further decades ...
 


 
The following week was a bit slower, especially the wednesday is a quite calm day. I started with the water colour job at the IMSA Performance painting on that wednesday, as I had prepared the sketch over the weekend before, whenever it was a bit calmer at the stand. So it was interesting for some of my fans and collectors to walk by another time at the twelve days of Retromobile to see how the painting developed. See the final result please with painting #269 at "all paintings" or "news & infos". (Thanks to Martin Groenen from Holland for the photo with the sketch and to Gilles Fernagut from Bouvines/ France for the shots when I nearly had finished the ten days work on this project. All was topped by a mechanic of team IMSA performance signing the original when I had finished it on saturday afternoon.
 




 
Son and father Alexandrovitch visited my stand and were very interested at my Le Mans paintings. No wonder, father Alexandrovitch himself had driven an AC Ace Bristol in 1962 at Le Mans. Car #28 with Magne-Alexandrovitch was the class winner. And here he was, a magnificient moment and a great talk to father and son. I would be very proud to do a painting for them, as they had in mind at the show. I will go through the history books anyway to see who I met at Paris in january again. Of course it is exciting to get introduced to a new topic, this time an AC Ace by the drivers themselves. Wonderful !
 


 
Thanks a lot to the wonderful people from FFSA, especially Hervé David and Stephanie Balzeau Dumont and Régis Prévost, which visited my stand over the weekends very often to have another chat about Formula Ford, Formula 3, great cars, great times and how wonderful the world can be if you have to do nothing else than race or talk about cars. Thank you for the wonderful time at Paris together with you ! The FFSA had two great cars among others on display. The Renault RS 10 of Jean Pierre Jabouille (just the one I had painted for Arnoux) and a March Formula 3, rebuilt by Hervé David Racing to show the great possibilities you have joining the FFSA, the official french motorsport organisation, which was represented by many of their race class organisators in the Retromobile days.
 




 
So a fantastic week ended with the unforgettable moment to unveil a painting with René Arnoux on the saturday evening. Please see the text at "news & Infos" for the details to this unforgettable hours with the Formula One driver of the late 70s and early 80s. A week full of ideas, people, memories, stories that cannot be forgotten, champaign and espresso, french atmosphere and charm, international flair, fantastic cars but most of all wonderful friends ! Special thanks Penny & Russ, Didier & Christophe, Christian & Gero, Markus & Daniel, Audrey & Nicolas, Francois & Pascalle, Venus & Iris for a magic week at Paris.
 








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Le Mans 24 hours 2010



My sixth year at the Sarthe. It was a wonderful year. Together with my great helpers Daniel Acar, Daniel Stahl and Dorrit my wife, we build up the stand on tuesday. With Witney Belle, my french helper and Audrey Belle, her sister, and Nicolas we had an international staff that helped me over the coming six days at Le Mans. It started quite cold and rainy, but though many my wonderful collectors and friends visited our stand in "village central". The excitement grew, when Christopher and Tobias, Nicolas and Audrey joined us at friday and saturday. Who would win this years race: everybody answered "definitely Peugeot". In GT2 nobody had an answer, as the Corvettes impressed with a fantastic speed, the Porsche and Ferraris not too far behind, but beaten in Q1 and Q2, only with the Alesi/Fisichella 430 in reach. In GT 1 the Saleen Larbre of my good friend Jack Leconte went later to a class win, against the new opposition of the wonderful Ford GT 40 with also one complete female driver team. In all 4 classes a great race to come ! And it was fantastic ! We had Kangaroo TV, thanks to Christopher, and we had more infos than ever before. Great to have this little screen. A real must for the next years together with the incredible Radio Le Mans of my friends Graham Tyler ( I will learn this spelling one day) and John Hindhaugh, who also visited my booth.

Ron Fellows and Jan Magnussen, Johnny O´Connel and Stefan Mücke also visited our stand. It was a huge pleasure to talk to the Corvette and Aston drivers and share the excitement of what was to come with them. With the race engineers of the Saleen, the Peugeot 908 and the Audis i had an interesting discussion in my stand again. What will come, who will win, who has its advantages... Nobody told secrets, but it was nice having them in the stand for at least the latest news about their performance, just a day or hours before the start. Who would have thought that Peugeot would have so much bad luck this year. On my way back, monday after the event I met a happy Timo Bernhard at a gas station, who had just won Le Mans. It was fantastic to talk to him - right away he commissioned me to paint his victory. What a crazy thing !

The new Peugeot painting of last years winner flying down the Hunaudières, the Tyrannosaurus Rex painting with the two Corvettes and the Aston Martin LMP1s in front of the very pale Dunlop bridge and pine trees where the most sought after paintings this year together with the Audi R15 painting displaying the Kristensen car on the Hunaudières. I will paint the Audi Trio for next years Le Mans, as it surely was a outrageous victory to Audi and of course the new Corvette GT2 car, may be in a fight with the 430. But let´s see what the next year with the rule change brings. I heard from quite outrageous car designs and things to come...

Thanks a lot to all the friends and collectors who could not resist visiting our twelve friends strong team this year again! Thanks to Pascal, Francois, Geoff, Jane, Robert, Armanda, Olivier, Bruno, Ana, Andreas, Drew and all my good friends and interesting guests over these magic six days at the Sarthe !!! The following fotos may be a little bit of a memory for the one or the other of my wonderful team (Thank you so much friends!!!!) and some of my collectors. See you in 2011 !!!!
 

Goodwood Festival of Speed 2010



The heat was on at Chichester and Goodwood Park. The most beautiful air show ever, lovely stands and beautiful cars. Together with the possibility for a glass of champaign, some strawberries and cream at the Audis stand and wonderful girls all around, this was another highlight of the motorsport calendar. Though we all were very exhausted because of the heat in our stands, we had a lovely show. With the godfather of John Surtees son commissioning me to paint an original with Johns son racing his last race car for this years auction for the head injury charity foundation in end of the year at London, this was my personal highlight of the year concerning a commission. What an honour ! A tragic one, it could make me sad, but also a huge honour and aim to work for. Possibly my two sons will be able to unveil the painting at the auction. One of the most emotional moments for me to come. Read more on my website in winter please.

Thanks to Markus and Cindy for the magnificient help, thanks to all my neighbours for the good times and the helping hands. See you there in 2011 !
 

Le Mans Classic 2010



Oh Lord, what an event ! I always thought that Le Mans Classic 2008 would be untopable. But this years event topped everything I ever saw. The heat made it sometimes really dramatic, but I guess I have never seen such a rolling musuem and never have had such an effort before with my paintings. With about 20 orders for large canvas prints and numberless sales of prints in all sizes, this was a magic event. Good luck, that Audrey, Nicolas, Pascal and Francois, Geoff and Jane were there to help Daniel and me. We never would have been able to stand this alone.

Jochen Mass visited our stand and I gave him an Alfa GTA painting as a gift. He started his carreer from Mannheim with the Alfa Team Hähn, where I had purchased my first automotive love, an Alfa Spider. It was another great moment to have a little moment talking to Mass.

The evenings in the town with still the football world championship going on was another top. The final with my friend Hendrik, Daniel and Aclee in the french bar was marvellous! The game could have been better, but the spanish won and deserved it. Of course I would have loved the German team to look better against Spain, but you cannot have it all. Though they played a good tournament and they are my champions of the heart. May be the loveliest football was played by them.

























 
 

Silverstone Classic 2010



With the best weather since five years at the mythical track in Northamptonshire the base was given for another great event. With 71000 spectators and 700 race cars, more than 3000 club cars and my two great helpers Daniel Acar and my son Tim Ehret in companion it was just marvellous! I had finally the chance to meet all my SRC friends and have an evening at the Silverstone Racing Club. Highlights of my weekend were the wonderful evening with Geoff, Jane, Martin, Peter, Janet in the SRC and to meet Liz Halliday, the Le Mans driver at my stand on the saturday. I got to know her a little bit more and was introduced to the historic race team, she raced for (Alfa TZ and Lotus Elans) and the invitation by my good friend Ben Horne to lunch at the sunday next to my stand. Thanks to all of you once again ! Tim, Daniel and I went home with some more memories, nice little presents and new ideas for coming paintings. Needless to say, we sold again most of what we had with us. Fantastic !!! Thanks a lot to David Wood for bringing the cards to the SRC and to try to sell them there for me over winter. Also thanks a lot to Luke Whigley from Goose Communications for the great stand again. Best Greetings to all my friends, especially Steve & Pippa, Nick & Peppi and Penny & Russ. Hope to see you all soon again !















 
 

Goodwood Revival 2010



Goodwood Revival 2010, an unforgettable mixture of motorsport, air displays and beautiful people. Some surprises by Lord Marchs organisation staff again: a group of singers dressed in pre war and 50s style sang melodies and evergreens of that era. Of course I had to invite them to sing in front of my stand. Other surpises was a Tesco´s shop in the look of the 50s and 60s but also with partly products designed like they were in the old times. Stunning. A magic moment of my weekend happened on our way home on thrusday. We missed the right exit and had to drive all around the track. No problem on such a beautiful evening. The sun went down and a Mustang and a Spitfire trained in the sky. But than, just when we were in height of the airfiled, the Spitfire landed. She came across our little van, so it seemed we could have touched here. She landed no 50 meters from us on the lawn of Goodwood airfield, which is part of the track and attraction of the weekend. The van vibrated, when the Merlin motor passed us in some five or ten meters height. Just magic ! Vibrations also at our stand: The new Jimmie Guthrie took many people in, also the new Richard Seaman painting found five new homes in the large XXL version. Some even go to Sweden and the USA. Most of my english collectors came in - a sheer pleasure. Thanks to all of you visiting me there again ! The originals of "Stuttgart - Le Mans - Stuttgart" and the "AC Cobra at Le Mans 1963" went both to England. There will be tears in the Porsche Club in Germany ... Also the Mini Cooper original "Santas New Fleet" found a new home, along with the Seaman and the Guthrie original. Four more commissions for paintings have been discussed, so the portfolio will spread even broader over winter. Keith Ahlers ordered his Morgan Le Mans winning car from 1962 as a cut out of painting #226, he is the owner of this car and raced at Le Mans with the Morgan Aero in the Ninetees. Books, prints and cards sold even better this years september Revival. Alltogether an outrageous weekend ! Thank you to all of you ! Special thanks to Annette, Chris and Mike from Whitmore Jones Ltd. Chichester for their great support and help once again ! Many many thanks also to Jörg Stehr for not only keeping the shop proper and always wearing a smile and having a helping hand all the time, but also guiding and guarding me over the six days we had together there. We had a great weekend ! See you at Veterama in octobre in Mannheim Germany or in early february at Paris Retromobile ! If not, have a great winter time until my season starts again at the Le Mans 24 hours 2011 !!!