BMW brings digital art to cars at CES 2022
This "holistic user experience" will be available in production BMWs this year.
BMW is no stranger to art cars, having commissioned them for decades. But at tech's biggest trade show, CES 2022, BMW is bringing art inside the car digitally, debuting its new Digital Art Mode in the 2023 iX M60.
Digital Art Mode brings a piece of, well, digital art, into the curved display that sits atop the iX's dashboard. BMW says this is a "holistic user experience," and can be turned on or off with the touch of a button. Activating Digital Art Mode adjusts the powertrain and steering settings, cabin lighting and even ambient sound, and puts new graphics up on the curved display. I'll admit, this sounds a little gimmicky, but I'll reserve final judgment until someone from Roadshow can try out Digital Art Mode in person.
We'll be able to do that soon, by the way; BMW says Digital Art Mode will be made available for its production cars starting this year. The company will even let compatible vehicles be retrofitted to include this technology via an over-the-air software update. Considering the iX M60 is the car being used to display this tech, I'm willing to bet that's where it'll show up first.
This isn't just any ol' digital art, by the way. BMW teamed up with Chinese multimedia artist Cao Fei, who actually designed the company's 2017 M6 GT3 art car. You can see the digital art design in the gallery below, and I have to admit, it looks pretty cool.
Digital Art Mode isn't the only bit of technology BMW has on display at CES 2022. The company also debuted a new 31-inch rear-seat entertainment display, as well as color-changing body panels and the 2023 iX M60.
