‘Tasting Good’: An Artist Just Ate One of Maurizio Cattelan’s $120,000 Bananas in Miami

The museum that acquires an edition of Maurizio Cattelan’s
Comedian will have to carefully consider its security
after an artist ate the $120,000 banana duct taped to the wall of
an art fair booth. The edible piece of conceptual art on sale
at Galerie Perrotin in Art Basel in Miami Beach tasted good,
declared New York-based David Datuna on Saturday, although he
grumbled there was too much tape.

Cattelan’s Paris-based dealer Emmanuel Perrotin raced back to
the fair from Miami airport on Saturday afternoon when he heard of
the act of vandalism. With the help of assistant the gallerist soon
restored the Italian artist’s work to the wall of his booth. The
gallerist always had a spare in reserve in a back room. Four Miami
Beach police officers stood guard after the incident,
the Miami
Herald reports. And a rope barrier was added to
control the crowds of curious fair goers as the sculpture’s fame
soared.

Datuna, who claimed to be a “hungry artist,” was led away by
security but not arrested, the Herald reports. He staged
his self-described “performance” at 1.45 p.m. on Saturday during
the fair’s popular public day, so many A-list collectors will have
missed the commotion. Video of the Georgia-born artist’s nonchalant
act of appropriation quickly circulated on social media,
however.

After swift sales to private collectors, Cattelan and Perrotin
agreed that they would sell the third edition of Comedian
to a museum. Perrotin told Artnet
News that two had already expressed an interest. The
French gallerist was relaxed about the work’s security ahead of
Saturday’s incident, explaining that without the artist’s
certificate of authenticity, the banana is no longer a sculpture,
and so reverts to being a piece of fruit.

Comedian was the instant talking point of Art
Basel Miami Beach 2019, and a social media sensation. It even made
the front page of the New York Post. Galerie Perrotin
posted an image on Instagram of the tabloid taped to a wall in the
style of the work of art. The disappearance of a banana Cattelan
had picked for his conceptual work of art into another artist’s
stomach looks set to guarantee Comedian even more column
inches.

The banana’s notoriety mirrors Cattelan’s solid-gold toilet,
America, which also satirizes conspicuous
consumption. That work of conceptual art
remains missing after it was stolen from Blenheim Palace in England
in an audacious heist in October.

The post ‘Tasting Good’: An Artist Just Ate One of Maurizio
Cattelan’s $120,000 Bananas in Miami appeared first on artnet
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