NF500 / charity

You may remember a while back a Tracey Emin Fiat 500 went under the hammer for charity and sold for £42,000.

Well, despite recent tales of doom and gloom surrounding the economy in the media recently, her latest Fiat 500 to go up for auction, this time a little number titled “Dark, Dark, Dark”, sold for an incredible £200,000.

Absolute Return for Kids charity (ARK) raised £25 million for children at a gala reception in the Royal Naval College, Greenwich last week, with an auction in which this one off Fiat 500 was included.

Thanks (once again) to top news spotter KevinB for finding out the sale details.

The first of four new Fiat 500 cars illustrated by renowned English artist Tracey Emin has been sold at auction for £42,000.

The work, entitled ‘I Told You Not To’, is one of four specially designed and painted examples of the supermini, which have taken the art world by storm. Described as taking Emin’s work “quite literally out of the gallery and on to the street”, the cars have created the first moving exhibition of its kind.

The 500 went under the hammer for $85,000 last Saturday (13 October) during the Contemporary Art Auction at the Phillips de Pury & Company saleroom in London.

Proceeds from the sale will go to the artist’s chosen charity PEAS, which is raising funds for a school library in Uganda. Additional funds will also help establish future Fiat art projects in London.

The three other 500s with Emin designs will also be offered at auction, one before the end of the year and two in 2008.

I really enjoyed working on the Fiat 500, which I refer to as the ‘mouse car’,

said Tracey Emin.

The Fiat 500 range goes on sale throughout the UK with a choice of petrol and diesel engines and three trim levels, in January 2008.

To coincide with Frieze art fair, artist Tracey Emin has been commissioned by Fiat to design artwork for four unique Fiat 500s, which will be used to help publicise the 500 prior to launch in the UK.

Tracey Emin has apparently been given an example to drive about the show in, and another example will go under the hammer on October 13th at the Contemporary Art Auction, the proceeds of which will go to charity PEAS to raise funds for a school library in Uganda.

If anyone ever needed a car giving to them, it has to be an internationally renown top class footballer.  Fortunately for Juventus captain and World Cup winner Alessandro Del Piero, Fiat have (so far as our translation tools and skills can figure) gifted him with an exclusive No.10 new Fiat 500.

Lorenzo Sistino, CEO of Fiat Automobiles, handed the new 500 to Del Piero at the Mirafiori Motor Village, inside the historic Mirafiori plant in Turin.  The 500 in question is a 1.4 Sport model with automatic air conditioning, fog lamps, and red painted brake callipers listed among its optional extras.

We’re not sure if there’s any kind of charity tie in or if it’s a pure case of “give a footballer a free car, get some cool credits in return”, but we really hope it’s the former, or he actually paid for it.  If anyone knows for sure, we’d love to know score here!