Source – A banana duct-taped to a wall sold for $120,000 at Miami’s Art Basel… The fruit and tape in question was the work of Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan, and it literally is just a banana duct-taped to a wall, titled “The Comedian.” CBS News reports that there are actually three “editions” of the work of art, two of which have been sold. The third banana is expected to go for an even higher $150,000.
On the one hand, the hundred-thousand-dollar banana duct-taped to a wall is Good. People always like to dismiss modern art as simplistic, often remarking, “I could make that.” The go-to comeback to this statement is, “Yeah, but you didn’t.”
And, as a piece of art, “The Comedian” actually does have something to say. Emmanuel Perrotin—the founder of Perrotin, the gallery where the work was displayed—told CBS News that the piece is about how the meaning and importance of objects changes depending on the context.
Well folks, I think we can go ahead and turn the lights off on our modern society and shut things down once and for all. We’ve reached a new low. Someone just purchased a banana taped to a wall for $120,000. Let’s let that fact pause and sink in for a moment. In a world where 60% of people lack consistent access to clean water (I made that stat up because I’m too lazy to look up actual stats and it seems like a reasonable stat) someone just spent the price of a college education on a stick of sugar, potassium, and fiber worth maybe 50 cents and a piece of duct tape worth maybe the same amount and the only thing setting these items apart from all other just like them is that they are taped to a wall together.
This begs the question: WHY???? WHY??? WHY???? (Nancy Kerrigan voice) Why would anyone buy this? I think there’s only one explanation: It must have been a rich guy doing it to save face. No other logic makes sense here. I mean, you don’t get rich enough to casually drop $120K on questionable abstract art by, well, dropping $120K on questionable abstract art. However, once a person is rich enough to wipe their ass with over a tenth of a million dollars and casually flush that money down the toilet (which is EXACTLY what this buyer did) then we have to assume he is doing it for a good reason.
In this case I’m willing to bet that good reason was to maintain status in the rich guy pecking order. I’m pretty sure things developed like this: One rich guy, let’s call him Wellington Montford III, joked to his fellow well heeled buddy, Hermatige Armatige IV, how funny it would be to buy the banana / duct tape “art” piece and then ol’ Herms calmly replied to our boy Wellsy, “Bet you won’t do it.” And just like that, it was on. You see, if I learned anything from watching the movie You Got Served it was that if you dance and they dance back, then “IT’S ON!” My friends, that little exchange between our two hypothetical trust fund titans was the 1%’s version of a dance battle in a seedy unoccupied warehouse in an industrial area just outside of town. So, you see Wellington HAD to buy that taped up piece of monkey food because if he didn’t he’d become the laughing stock of everyone in The Hamptons this summer and Wellington Montford III is many things, but he is never the catalyst for laughter at his expense.