Why a Banana Taped to the Wall Could Be Worth $1 Million

For those wondering, the piece does not include that same banana from Miami five years ago. Instead, the fruit and the duct tape are meant to be regularly replaced. What is for sale is the rights to the artwork, and the buyer will take home a certificate of authenticity that grants authority to reproduce this banana and duct tape on their wall as an original artwork by Maurizio Cattelan. Of course, anyone could tape a banana to their wall, but it won’t be the artwork by Maurizio Cattelan.

Conceived in an edition of three plus two artist proofs, one edition is held in the collection of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, where Cattelan had announced his retirement as an artist. This work presented at Art Basel was the first showing at a fair in 15 years, adding to the allure.

Titled Comedian, the humoristic piece can be considered a challenge to the sometimes-absurdist nature of the art market and the art collecting world. “To me, Comedian was not a joke; it was a sincere commentary and a reflection on what we value,” said the artist in an interview at the time. “At art fairs, speed and business reign, so I saw it like this: if I had to be at a fair, I could sell a banana like others sell their paintings. I could play within the system, but with my rules.” Versions of the work have since been displayed in a number of museums around the world, including UCCA Center for Contemporary Art in Beijing; Leeum Museum of Art in South Korea, Palazzo Bonaparte in Rome, and the National Gallery of Victoria in Australia.

While the piece is comedic in nature, it should not be passed off as just a cheap prank but ought to be considered in the context of his whole oeuvre.Born in 1960 in Padua, Italy, Cattelan is a self-taught artist who cut his teeth making furniture before turning to art in 1989. Much of his early work sought to challenge the people and systems of the art world, quickly gaining him the reputation as an enfant terribile. Calling himself an “art worker,” rather than an artist, Cattelan is now one of the leading contemporary artists of his generation, employing his signature wit, macabre sense of humor, and satire to a broad range of mediums, from sculpture, to taxidermy, and performance.

In the mid-1990s, Cattelan became known for his use of taxidermy and by the latter half of the decade, he had begun to create life-sized hyper-real wax sculptures. One iconic work, for example, La Nona Hora (1999), depicts Pope John Paul II being struck by a meteor, a hilarious act of divine retribution. The subject of major exhibitions around the world, past shows have included a 2011 retrospective the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York. Titled “All,” it spanned his entire body of work to date suspended on ropes around the rotunda of the iconic Frank Gehry-designed museum.

More recently, in 2019, his works transformed the stately rooms of Blenheim Palace in the UK. Titled “Victory is Not an Option,” the show was a response to the martial and political history of the Palace, exploring themes of national identity and power.

Earlier this year, he presented a powerful new work at Gagosian in New York. Titled Sunday, it was his first show solo gallery exhibition in more than two decades. An update on his work America—a functional solid gold toilet that he installed at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, in 2016—this installation featured large panels of stainless steel plated in 24-karat gold, which had been “modified” by gunfire. A response to the economic inequality in the country, the work, like much of his practice, explores contractions in American society and culture.

As far as Comedian goes, one Sotheby’s advisor says it could be considered a self-portrait, marking his position as the jester of the art world. In the center of the commercial art world, he is presenting a work that mocks the very nature of it.