Last month, Maurizio Cattelan’s “Comedian,” a piece of conceptual art that consists of a banana duct taped to a wall, sold at a Sotheby’s auction for $6.2 million. WSJ’s Kelly Crow traces the banana’s origins from Art Basel Miami in 2019 to the top of the art market this year. Further Listening: - A Russian Billionaire, an Art Dealer and an Epic Feud - The Basquiat Sisters on Managing One of Art's Hottest Brands Further Reading: - A $6.2 Million Banana and the Unexpected Return of the Art Market - Someone Just Paid $6.2 Million for a Banana Duct-Taped to a Wall Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Chapter 1: What is the story behind the $6 Million banana?
Can you tell me the story of when you first heard about the banana?
Okay, so my beginnings with the banana was the opening day of Art Basel Miami Beach in 2019.
That's our colleague Kelly Crow, who covers the art market. Art Basel Miami is a big high-end art fair that happens every December. Kelly was there walking around, checking out the sculptures and paintings. And then...
I did see this banana duct taped to a wall And I saw a little half circle of people I call, you know, little looky-loos just taking pictures of it. And they were not the types to buy the work. They were just having fun and posing and taking selfies with it. And I remember in that moment, like, oh, isn't that cute? But I logged it and then I moved on.
So like you didn't you didn't get a selfie with the banana?
I didn't. I didn't get my selfie.
Back in 2019, when it first showed up at Art Basel, Kelly and others in the art world were somewhat dismissive of the banana, which was listed for sale at $120,000. It seemed just like another quirky piece of contemporary art. She didn't think it would be that big of a deal.
And we totally missed the point, which is that the entire rest of the art world thinks that the art world is an entire, you know, rigged game and a scam and a joke. And did the emperor like even wear clothes to the fair that day? Because somebody duct taped a banana to a wall and asked $120,000 for it. And that moment probably did need to stop and be reckoned with in real time.
While Kelly brushed past it, lots of other people stayed and gawked. The banana duct-taped to a wall became a viral sensation. And that was just the beginning.
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Chapter 2: How did the banana become a viral sensation?
So over the past five years, the banana has gone on to have an incredibly strange afterlife. Several editions have sold, you know, between $120,000 and $150,000. One has since gotten donated to the Guggenheim, one of the most important museums in New York City. Others have gone on to become basically deified in meme form, and it ultimately culminated in an auction at Sotheby's.
And I'm selling it here. the world's most expensive banana, at $5,200,000. These are words I never thought I'd say. $5 million for a banana.
Welcome to The Journal, our show about money, business, and power. I'm Ryan Knudsen. It's Friday, December 6th. coming up on the show, what one banana can tell us about the art market, the power of perception, and maybe even the economy. Okay, so before we dive into the flesh of the banana, can you explain exactly what this piece of art is?
You want me to peel it back a little bit? Is that what you're asking me to do?
Yes, please. Yeah, just yeah.
What does the banana tell us? Is that what you're asking?
Who is on the banana phone, if you will?
Well, let's try to run through all the puns we can possibly think of.
We should. We have to, actually. I don't know why I wasn't more prepared with this.
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Chapter 3: What are the instructions for displaying the banana art?
retirement to put this banana on the wall. And it really was kind of his like middle finger to the art market. He really was trying to say, look, you know, this entire fair is going to be brimming with pretty paintings.
So why don't I just cut through all the noise of that and I'll just do something simple and a little bit provocative and I will put a banana on the wall and I will call it art and let's just see what sort of, you know, grenade goes off or not.
The grenade definitely went off. Comedian went viral at that 2019 Art Basel. It drew massive crowds and got turned into memes and splashed onto T-shirts. Catalan made five versions of the banana, and each one sold. Why do you think this piece of art resonates so much with people?
I think it was just funny. It was funny and simple and audacious. And the idea that an artist would call this art, the idea that it would have value and the idea that other people would agree with him that it has value. There's just a level of absurdity there that he acknowledges. He was trying to lean into that.
How did he feel about the fact that this middle finger was like being celebrated? Yeah.
I think he was on the one hand, I'm sure very tickled because he had caused a stir. And that's really what he's always wanted to do as an artist is sort of make waves and start a conversation. And I think he was certainly pleased, certainly pleased by that, because that is part of what he wanted to do was just to sort of shake things up a little bit. And he certainly did.
After the break, the banana arrives in New York and tests a slippery art market. The banana hit the auction houses when people in the art market were feeling pretty rotten. It had been in a slump for about two years, with sales down across the board. Prices for the world's top artists have fallen by as much as half.
So there are various reasons why art sells and doesn't sell, but the art market is cyclical like anything else, right? And there are certain years where everyone is feeling flush and the world's wealthy feel like it's a good idea to buy and sell art at the very upper reaches and everything's fine and the art world feels like a party.
And then there are things like war and elections and the pandemic and these macroeconomic factors that can cause... even if they're the world's wealthiest people. These are billionaires. They have money in good markets and bad, right? They have it, but they feel a little sensitive to sort of splurge. It's a confidence game, right? How confident do they feel spending millions of dollars on art?
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Chapter 4: What makes Maurizio Cattelan's art provocative?
How did the auction go?
I mean, it was completely unforgettable.
Was it bananas?
It was bananas. B-A-N-A-N-A-S. Absolutely.
B-A-N-A-N-A-S.
Exactly. I've been humming that for days. So when I walked into the auction room, the anticipation was building, but people didn't have to wait too long. And the artworks kind of come out on this thing, like sort of the turntable sort of swiveled, right?
And then out came this banana taped to the wall with one, you know, very tickled art handler standing there like Vanna White, you know, beside this banana.
The viral sensation that has skyrocketed to universal recognition when it was first exhibited at the Art Basel Miami Beach in December 2019, Maurizio Catalan's comedian, here it is in all its splendor.
And the scene was so ridiculous. Everyone's cell phones went up. It was like whoosh, this vertical whoosh of, I mean, cynical art dealers, folks who've been buying and selling art for decades. None of them could resist the urge to snap a little picture of that thing on the turntable.
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Chapter 5: How has the art market responded to the banana?
Oh, dude, you know I was already Instagram-living it. I mean, I was theirs, yeah.
Did you finally get your banana selfie?
Yeah, I finally got my moment with the Dane banana. I mean, of course, I had it with like 600 or 700 people in this auction room.
Chapter 6: What factors influence art sales and market trends?
$5,100,000.
They're not getting these jokes. $5,100,000.
Don't worry, Mr. Auctioneer, we got your jokes. There were seven different bidders for the banana, and eventually one emerged as the winner.
The Catalan is yours. Congratulations. Thank you very much indeed.
After taxes and fees, the total bill was $6.2 million. The buyer said he intended to pay for it in cryptocurrency. Who bought the banana?
So the winner of the banana is this young guy in his early 30s named Justin Sun. And he is the co-founder of a cryptocurrency platform called Tron. And he is a very colorful character who sort of came into the art world back in the beginning days of the NFT boom. You know, back when people were... You know, JPEGs were selling for $70 million. You remember that, right? During the pandemic.
So a lot of these guys sort of came into this world of collecting back then. And they sort of stuck around.
I was just going to say, in some ways, the banana reminds me of NFTs because... An NFT, it's just this digital piece of art, but the thing that you own is the certificate that proves that you own it. And the banana is kind of the same way. It's, you know, it's ephemeral, it's disposable, but it's the certificate that you have that says, I own that banana, that concept.
Same thing. Yep. That clicked for him in big ways. And he found that very profound that this artwork actually operated just like things on the blockchain do. And for him, that bridge, right, was so enticing. He just felt like he had to own it.
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