Drive often enough across parts of California, New York, and Detroit and you’ll eventually find yourself looking over to see a vehicle wrapped in a strangely frumpy looking exterior disguising its brand and provenance. It’s a commonplace practice within the automotive industry to swathe upcoming models in obfuscating disguises ahead of their official unveiling. The wraps permit automakers to test vehicles out in the open in real world environments without giving too much away about the exterior styling to the public, competitors, and press. Luxury automaker INFINITI’s upcoming flagship QX80 is being previewed wearing some ironically eye-catching camouflage intentionally meant to be noticed.
The Japanese automaker called upon the talents of Kaoru Tanaka, a generative digital artist based in Osaka, Japan, to imagine a digital pattern intentionally contradictory in its purposes. Directly referencing the synaptic links of the brain and the “pulsing and living DNA sequence” the grayscale/monochromatic sequential pattern that effectively hides the specifics of the full-size luxury QX80’s exterior detailing. But this being part of an advertising campaign, Tanaka’s efforts are also tasked to bring attention to the vehicle as one giant piece of art to promote INFINITI’s new design language, “Artistry in Motion.”Â
The artist primarily develops her work using TouchDesigner, a node-based visual programming language optimized for real-time interactive multimedia content and projection mapping projects for the likes of Shiseido’s Future Reflections generative art gallery event and fashion house, Prada.
In the video below, Tanaka is shown working within TouchDesigner:
Tanaka’s Artistry in Motion design mirrors the QX80’s segmented LED headlamp assembly, double-arched grille, and “digital piano key” lighting, a pattern also evocative of a broadcast video test pattern and the repetitive geometry of African batik designs.
Tanaka’s digital art wrap came off yesterday during a planned livestream of the 2025 INFINITI QX80 unveiling event before its upcoming appearance at the 2024 New York International Auto Show starting Friday, March 29 through Sunday, April 7. But if you want an additional idea of what the QX80 will look like, check out its direct concept predecessor, the the QX Monograph concept here.
