The work called “Comedian” and created by Italian artist Maurizio Catellan has sparked controversy since it was first exhibited at the Art Basel exhibition organized in Miami Beach in 2019.
A banana stuck to a wall could break the auction ceiling this Wednesday, November 20. In addition to offering a painting from Claude Monet’s Water Lilies series, the sale organized in New York by Sotheby’s will feature a simple fruit hung on a wall using gray adhesive tape.
The auction house estimates that this work of art could be sold for between 1 and 1.5 million dollars (between 950,000 and 1.4 million euros), explains Associated Press. For this price, the buyer will be given a certificate of authenticity as well as instructions for replacing the fruit when it becomes too ripe.
“Isn’t it stuck there to be eaten?”
Signed by the Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan, the work exists in three copies and named Comedian caused a sensation in 2019, when it was exhibited in Miami Beach, Florida, during the Art Basel exhibition. The taped banana, which had already sold for $120,000, had been eaten by another artist, David Datuna. This American had filmed what he presented as an “artistic performance”. He titled it Hungry Artist (“Hungry Artist”).
Last year, the scenario was repeated in South Korea. While one of the three copies of Comedian was on display at the Leeum Museum of Art in Seoul, a student took the banana off the wall to eat it. He then taped the skin of the fruit before leaving. The student justified his action by explaining that he was “hungry”.
“Damaging a work of art could also be considered a work of art, I thought that would be interesting… Isn’t it stuck there to be eaten?” he had added.
Toilets stolen in 2019
For David Galperin, in charge of contemporary art at Sotheby’s, Maurizio Cattelan’s work aims to “hold up a mirror to the world of contemporary art and to ask questions, to provoke reflection on the way in which we attribute of value to works of art, about what we define as a work of art.
Besides Comedian, Maurizio Cattelan is also known for Americaan 18-karat gold toilet with working seat, bowl and flush. The work, estimated at up to $6 million (around 5.7 million euros), was stolen in 2019 while it was on display at Blenheim Palace, England. It has never resurfaced since.
Due to his reputation, Maurizio Cattelan himself was accused at the time of having set up a hoax. In this case, the Italian banana lover always denied having taken people for pears.
