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  • 00:02 ANDY: To me customisation is art.

  • 00:08 COMM: Andy Saunders is an artist, and his

  • cars are his canvas. The car customiser is renowned for his outlandish creations. With

  • each of his 52 vehicles outdoing the last.

  • 00:20 ANDY: Well these are magazine features on

  • a lot of the cars that I've done. Some of these are really famous now like that was

  • Mini Ha Ha, I done that as my third or fourth car.

  • 00:30 ANDY: Indecision and Run aground the speedboat,

  • they're both owned by a big car collector in London, Claustrophobia is now in Tokyo

  • in a museum.

  • 00:40 COMM: His work has resulted in several entries

  • into the Guinness Book Of World Records, and he believes car customisation is art, he has

  • exhibited in galleries and even tried to enter the Turner Prize.

  • 00:54 COMM: Andy from Poole customised his first

  • car before he was even old enough to hold a UK driving license.

  • 01:00 ANDY: My first customisation was a MK1 Escort

  • called Bird Puller, built by me and my dad. Bird Puller was actually a bit of a bird puller,

  • but not until I was seventeen because when I was sixteen and we used to go to the car

  • shows it was driven by my mum.

  • 01:13 COMM: And he's dedicated his life to his artwork

  • ever since.

  • 01:17 COMM: Andy developed a reputation for himself

  • as a revolutionary in car design. And his flair for the weird and wonderful has won

  • him countless high profile commissions.

  • 01:27 ANDY: Hyundai launched the cheapest car in

  • the world to have air conditioning and they came to me and asked me if I would build them

  • an ice cream van to kind of promote the air conditioning factor. And I had two commissions

  • from them within three weeks.

  • 01:41 COMM: Andy dedicates endless hours to perfect

  • his world record breaking creations. But he can knock a car together in no time at all

  • if needs be.

  • 01:51 ANDY: Over the last three or four years I've

  • been taken on stage at big car events and had to build cars in ridiculous times. Such

  • as Flat Out for instance was the lowest car in the world and it was built in three days

  • at Beaulieu.

  • 02:06 COMM: Andy even entered his work for the prestigious

  • Turner Prize. But unfortunately not everyone sees his work as art.

  • 02:14 ANDY: I'd seen a picture in the newspaper

  • of an out of focus polaroid of Concorde taking off and it was going to be entered for the

  • Turner Prize and I thought what a load of rubbish, so I went to the local art centre

  • and said this is what I do, how do I go about organising an exhibition. I received 76 nominations

  • from the public for that exhibition. At the end of it there was no response at all from

  • the Tate, the Turner or anyone else.

  • 02:40 ANDY: It's an art form, it should be recognised

  • as such. After that exhibition I had a man in Ireland, he actually wanted two or three

  • of my cars. One of them being Picasso's Citroen. It was completely re-worked to look like a

  • Citroen 2CV that was asymmetric. I've had many artists come up and say although it's

  • not out kind of art, it can only be described as art.

  • 03:05 COMM: When he isn't cruising around in one

  • of his spectacular vehicles, Andy can be found hard at work in his garage.

  • 03:13 ANDY: This is my newest project, this is a

  • pre-war Hudson, which is actually a restoration, the car was so rust free, all of this up in

  • here, all of this, there's no welding been done at all, we didn't have to do any welding,

  • it was just perfect. This car is a 1958 Fiat Nuova Jolly. What I started with was the remnants

  • of a Jolly and I built this over a period of a couple of years on Saturdays. They made

  • approximately 540 of them. I've got no idea what the top speed of this is, I've had it

  • up to about 50 kilometres and to be honest with you that's more than enough.

  • 03:49 COMM: Andy has achieved remarkable success

  • through his hobby.

  • 03:53 ANDY: There's nothing on cars that I haven't

  • done or can't achieve if the budget is there then it's possible. I'm not getting bored

  • of it but my creativity is spreading to other things. A lot of current enthusiasts that

  • haven't done it think anyone can do this, they can't. No one has got the determination

  • to see each project through.

  • 04:10 COMM: But he admits his passion can take over

  • his life.

  • 04:13 ANDY: When you've got this much devotion for

  • anything it does affect your personal life. It is like a drug addiction, everything is

  • completely out of my peripheral view except the completion of that car.

00:02 ANDY: To me customisation is art.

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