United Airlines has unveiled a one-off livery celebrating the New York and New Jersey regions which the carrier serves from its Newark hub.
The special B757 livery was created by Corinne Antonelli, as part of United’s Her Art Here contest, which gave female artists the chance to “use an airplane as their canvas and inspire women around the world who are interested in a career in the arts”.
The aircraft features imagery including the Statue of Liberty, the New York City skyline, and the Red Mill in New Jersey.
United said that a B757 aircraft is roughly 3,666 times larger than the typical 18” x 24” canvas, and provides the artist with “a travelling canvas” which flies on average 1.6 million miles per year and over 470 cross-country trips.
The airline said that according to the National Museum of Women in the Arts, while 51 per cent of today’s artists are women, less than 13 per cent of art on display in the US is by female artists.
The contest was open to US resident artists identifying as a woman (including cisgender, transgender, woman-aligned or non-binary) – a second livery celebrating California is set to be unveiled in the coming weeks.
Commenting on the news, Washington-resident Antonelli said:
“It still feels like I am dreaming! I have seen the design on paper countless times, but now to see it, at its full scale in the physical world, there are no words to describe how proud I feel.
“My goal as an artist is to have people experience my art rather than just view it in a gallery, therefore having it displayed on an airplane has certainly been the most rewarding feeling I’ve ever experienced in my art career.”
Earlier this year United unveiled a new fleet-wide livery design, which will see the carrier swap out its gold highlights for a new blue design.
