What’s this banana art masterpiece worth? If you have to ask ...
If you see a banana at the Perrotin art gallery, avoid all temptations to eat it. The tropical fruit could very well cost you $120,000.
“I’m in serious discussion with a very important collector to buy it,” gallery owner Emmanuel Perrotin told the Miami Herald. “His reaction was very positive.”
Far from an ordinary banana, the one duct-taped to the Perrotin’s outer gallery wall at Art Basel Miami Beach is actually a work of art by renowned Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan. Titled “Comedian,” the work was produced this year and comes in an edition of 3, with 2 artist proofs. It comes with a Certificate of Authenticity, and owners can replace the banana, as needed.
As for the $120,000 price, Perrotin allowed that he may offer a discount for the first edition in the series. “But maybe not on the #2,” he said. “We are not arrogant. Maybe we’ll charge more on #3.”
Perrotin has worked with Cattelan for more than a quarter of a century and noted that the “Comedian” is the first new work that the artist has debuted at an art fair in more than 15 years. He has however collaborated with other artists. He teamed up with Pierpaolo Ferrari to create the “Pasta Wow” installation at the Beyeler Foundation booth at Art Basel Miami Beach 2016, complete with sinks and furnishings overflowing with spaghetti noodles.
Cattelan has a wicked sense of humor, with works that include a sculpture of the pope getting struck down by a meteorite.
And most recently: an 18-karat golden toilet that made headlines earlier this year when it was stolen from the Blenheim Palace in Oxfordshire, England. The toilet, titled “America,” was fully functional when it debuted three years ago at the Guggenheim Museum in New York. The museum curator offered to loan the work to the White House in lieu of a Vincent van Gogh painting that was too fragile to travel. The Trump administration declined the offer.
Cattelan’s banana offers insight into how we value objects. He originally sought to create a banana-shaped sculpture made of resin or bronze and then circled back to using a real banana. The work follows a hallowed tradition of avant-garde artists such as Piero Manzoni who sold “Bodies of Air (Corpi D’Aria)” in a series of inflated red, white or blue balloons.
In 1961, Manzoni sold 90 small cans labeled “Artist’s Shit (Merda d’Artista) for roughly $30. In 2016, the Milan-based auction house Il Ponte Casa d’Aste reportedly sold one of the cans for nearly $300,000.
This story was originally published December 4, 2019 at 1:32 PM.