A duct-taped banana sold for $6.2 million on Wednesday, Nov. 20, in New York City. The work of art by Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan is called “Comedian.”
After more than six minutes of bidding at Sotheby’s auction house, the winner was declared. Justin Sun, the Chinese-born founder of the cryptocurrency platform TRON, who watched the auction from Hong Kong, was the work’s new owner.
“Comedian” comes with installation instructions — 14 pages — that double as the certificate of authenticity. It instructs the owner to replace the fruit when needed with a supply of his own and to position the banana so it curves to the right and always displays vertically.
The piece was estimated to fetch between $1 million and $1.5 million, but bidders went far beyond that to be the top banana. Cattelan has said he crafted his work as a satirical jab at market speculation.
“Comedian” first debuted at a Miami Beach art event in 2019, where the Perrotin Gallery sold three editions for between $120,000 and $150,000 each. However, the work proved “ripe for the taking” for one performance artist, David Datuna, who ripped the banana right off the wall and ate it.
The piece has even caused an uproar in the crypto world. Earlier this month Sotheby’s executive Michael Bouhanna created a memecoin, crypto inspired by online trends or memes, based on Cattelan’s banana called “BAN.” It was direct competition with another “Comedian”-inspired memecoin minted in August called “BTW,” short for “banana tape wall.”
Sun said he will pay for the work in crypto. But what did the tycoon find so “appealing” about the duct-taped banana?
In a statement, Sun said the work “represents a cultural phenomenon that bridges the worlds of art, memes, and the cryptocurrency community.”
As for what he’ll do with it, he plans to “personally eat the banana as part of this unique artistic experience, honoring its place in both art history and popular culture.”
