At a conference he organized himself, Justin Sun, the new owner of the 6 million euro work of art, “Comedian”, tasted the fruit which we learned he had was purchased nine days earlier at a New York market.
Publicity stunt for the entrepreneur who has become a performer. Justin Sun, the wealthy Chinese-American owner of the work of art Comedian, or a banana hung on a wall by a piece of silver tape, ate the fruit this Friday, November 29 during a press conference organized in Hong Kong. He had acquired the work nine days earlier in New York for the modest sum of 5.9 million euros ($6.2 million). The journalists and influencers who attended the said “performance” of the founder of the cryptocurrency platform Tron all left with a roll of adhesive tape and a banana as a souvenir.
Before tasting, the thirty-year-old gave a speech in which he described“iconic” the creation of the iconoclastic and provocative Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan. Once he swallowed the first bite, he called the fruit “much better than other bananas”. According to him, it was ten seconds after winning the auction organized by Sotheby's on November 20 that Justin Sun made the irreversible decision to consume it. “Eating it at a press conference can also be part of the history of this work of art,” he boasted this Friday morning.
The Comedianwhich exists in three copies, can be renewed endlessly because each of the owners receives a certificate of authenticity as well as instructions on how to replace the fruit when it begins to rot. And this is not the first time that the work, which aims to question the notion of art and its value, gets devoured. In 2019, the year of its revelation, it was first eaten in Miami by another artist, David Datuna, then by a South Korean student during an exhibition in Seoul, in 2023.
Bought for a pittance
November 27th New York Times published an investigation into the origins of the banana eaten by Justin Sun. We learned that on the very day of the auction, the fruit was bought for a pittance – 25 cents, or 24 euro cents – on a New York market. The American daily reports that the seller of the banana, Shah Alamun, a 74-year-old seller from Bangladesh, cried when he learned the amount for which the banana had been sold. Comedian.
The day after the publication of this article, Justin Sun announced on X his decision to buy 100,000 bananas from Shah Alamun “to thank him”. The food will be available free of charge to consumers at the vendor's fruit stand, says Justin Sun.
Taking advantage of this spotlight, the founder of the cryptocurrency platform Tron compared conceptual works like Comedian to NFT (“non-fungible token”) art and decentralized blockchain technology. “Most of these objects and ideas exist as [propriété intellectuelle] and on the Internet, as opposed to something physical”he stressed. Justin Sun also announced this week an investment of $30 million (28.4 million euros) in World Liberty Financial, a cryptocurrency investment and borrowing platform, supported by US President-elect Donald Trump.
