A Guide to the Best of Southern California : CAR CULTURE : The Art of the Ferrari

A BOUQUET OF IRISES sells for $20. A Van Gogh painting of the same flowers will run you about $50 million. Exorbitant, yes, but at least in commercial and artistic sequence. Of inverse order is “Three Decades of Ferrari,” an art show hosted by Hollywood Sport Cars (through June 24). Prints of a Harold Cleworth acrylic of a Ferrari 250 GTO will be offered at a mere $300 apiece--while the real thing, a 1962 Ferrari 250 GTO, currently valued for between $10 million and $15 million. That any direct descendant from a used-car lot should be worth more than a half-dozen Faberge eggs is no surprise to Ferrari lovers or to Hollywood Sport Cars’ Cris Vandagriff: “The mystique is in the lines, the curves, the sleekness.”

“Through his designs, Mr. (Enzo) Ferrari was an artist,” Cleworth says. “And when he died, his work appreciated in value. Just like Van Gogh’s.”