David Lindquist

david.lindquist@indystar.com

Just in time for the 99th running of the Indianapolis 500, the Indianapolis Museum of Art will present its first automobile exhibition.

"Dream Cars: Innovative Design, Visionary Ideas" will feature more than 15 concept cars ranging from the 1930s to the 21st century. Companies represented will include General Motors, Bugatti, Chrysler and Alfa Romeo.

The one-of-a-kind vehicles will be on display May 3 to Aug. 23, a period that includes three major car races at Indianapolis Motor Speedway: the Angie's List Grand Prix of Indianapolis on May 9, the Indy 500 on May 24 and the Brickyard 400 on July 26.

"We have racing season, which brings in lots of people and gets us whipped up about automobiles in general," said Charles Venable, the museum's director and CEO.

Venable highlighted two more reasons for bringing "Dream Cars" to the museum:

• Last November, the IMA opened galleries that focus on design from the 1980s onward, with emphasis on design as industry and design as art.

• Indiana ranks as the second-biggest state for automotive gross domestic product, according to the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis. Although Michigan tops the chart, Indiana's car-making history dates to 1896 and includes companies such as Studebaker, Duesenberg and Stutz.

Ken Gross, guest curator for "Dream Cars," said the vehicles will be loaned from private collectors and museums worldwide.

One of the cars, a 1948 model boasting the first T-top in automotive history, resides at the Auburn Cord Duesenberg Automobile Museum in Auburn, Ind. Designed by Gordon Miller Buehrig, the TASCO ("The American Sports Car Company") prototype has been described as being part airplane and part car.

Gross said several post-World War II concept cars were influenced by space, rockets and aircraft. The 1953 General Motors Firebird I XP-21, for instance, resembles a jet plane with no wings.

"The sky was the limit at that point," Gross said. "America was on top of the world. We thought we'd be driving airplanes."

The "Dream Cars" show was on display earlier this year at Atlanta's High Museum of Art, where it attracted 180,000 visitors, Gross said.

Venable said the exhibition challenges the idea of "art" by encouraging visitors to view the vehicles as rolling sculpture.

He added that the designers of the concept cars were artists akin to Frank Lloyd Wright or Eero Saarinen.

"The people who designed these were basically architects who were not told to go build a house," Venable said. "They were told to go build a car."

Call Star reporter David Lindquist at (317) 444-6404. Follow him on Twitter: @317Lindquist.

"Dream Cars: Innovative Design, Visionary Ideas"

American and European concept car designs will be on display at the Indianapolis Museum of Art from May 3 through Aug. 23.