1929 Grand Prix de Monaco

The very first Grand Prix de Monaco took place on April 14th, 1929.

It was created as to bring international prestige to the Principality.

Sixteen drivers participated in that inaugural race, including Rudolf Caracciola, René Dreyfus, Philippe Étancelin and William Charles Frederick Grover-Williams.

That first race was won by Grover-Williams racing a Bugatti Type 35B.

Pen&ink, paint markers and markers on 18"x 12.75" (45.5cm x 32.5cm) blue archival paper © Paul Chenard    

I decided to create an artwork showing him in his Bugatti, and had a B&W photo as reference. I did the art on blue paper, as most often Bugatti's were in French racing blue.

After starting the art, I found out that he was racing in British racing green, so I used a yellow marker on the blue paper to get the green.

A happy mistake!

Ettore Bugatti - Le Patron

Ettore Bugatti, often referred to by staff as “Le Patron”, was born in Milan, Italy in 1881.

He apprenticed at a bicycle factory, where he designed his first motorized vehicle. Subsequently, he worked as an automobile designer for the Dietrich and then the Deutz car companies.

Blue Bugattis at Eau Rouge - 1934 Belgian Grand Prix
 Pen&ink, markers, Prismacolor white pencil and pencil on archival white stock 11.75”x 9”
© Paul Chenard 2010
Limited editions available.

In 1910, he started on his own in Molsheim, France, where he designed the Type 19 for Peugeot, called the “Bébé.”

At the same time, Bugatti was successfully racing a Type 13 “Brescia,” built for competition. This little racer carried the famous “horseshoe” radiator that became an earmark of Bugatti quality.

From the early 1920s to the early 1930s, he developed ever more refined and successful racers, such as Types 18, 35, 35B, 35C, 35T, 37, 37A, 39, 51, 54,and 59, as well as road cars, such as Types 40, 41, 50, 55, and 57.

There is a legend that the shades of blue of the Bugatti racecars were based on blue of the 1930’s Gauloise cigarette packages. Madame Bugatti would pull out her Gauloise package and compare it to the colour being used and have it “adjusted” to match the package.

Bugatti’s son Jean was a dynamic catalyst for change and development within the company. With his death in 1939 in a testing accident, and the ruin of the Molsheim factory during the Second World War, the company fortunes started to diminish.

Philippe "Phi-Phi" Etancelin on his way to winning the 1930 French Grand Prix in Pau, driving his 2-litre supercharged Bugatti Type 35C.
 My first scratchboard illustration 7"x 5" (17.8cm x 12.7cm)
© Paul Chenard 2010

This illustration is available.
Ettore Bugatti passed away in Paris in 1947 at the age of 65.

French Racing Blue

In these days of race cars covered with sponsors logos and colours, it’s easily to forget that race teams used to race for their country, not their sponsors.

To differentiate the country for which to team raced, a colour-coding was developed. The first usage of this came during Gordon Bennett Cup races in 1900-1905 which was a race between Nations and their automotive products. Germany was assigned white, Belgium yellow, USA red, United Kingdom green, and France blue.

As more and more countries got into racing, the colour palette grew, and some colours changed, most notably Germany to silver, Italy to red, and the USA to white with blue, but France maintained it’s traditional blue.

The cars that shared those various shades of French blue are Peugeot, Ballot, Amilcar, Salmson, Voisin, Delage, Delahaye, Talbot-Lago, Gordini, Alpine, Matra and of course, Bugatti.

1947 Simca Gordini T15
Photo courtesy & © John Mackenzie

1971 Matra-Simca MS120B
Photo courtesy & © John Mackenzie

They were much simpler times, when racers drove for their nation, and not necessarily the highest bidder.

This all changed in 1968, when Colin Chapman carried non-automotive, Players Gold Leaf cigarette graphics on his Lotus 49’s.

The advertising floodgates were opened for good … and gone, with very few exceptions, were the international colours.

All images © Paul Chenard