The most famous work of art of the last decade has found a new buyer. “Comedian”, a sculpture by artist Maurizio Cattelan, which consists of a piece of tape and a banana stuck to a wall, was sold for R$36 million (US$6.2 million) at Sotheby’s in New York, after more six minutes of intense competition. The buyer is Chinese-born cryptocurrency entrepreneur Justin Sun, the auction house confirmed.
In an interview with Bloomberg After the sale, Sun said he was considering paying with the cryptocurrency he founded, Tron (TRX), but, if that was not possible, with Bitcoin, which reached a record R$552,000 (US$95,000) at the time of the auction . (The lot was the only one of the night for which Sotheby’s would accept cryptocurrency payments.)
“First and foremost, I’m a cryptocurrency entrepreneur, but I also buy a lot of art,” says Sun, referring to his acquisitions of Picasso, Warhol and Giacometti. “I found out about ‘Comedian’ a month ago and I loved the idea,” he continues. “It resonates with our idea of decentralization in the cryptocurrency world, because this is a conceptual work of art—it is impossible to destroy the work itself.”
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The work, which is part of an edition of three (plus two artist’s proofs), had a pre-sale estimate of R$5 to 6 million (US$1 million to US$1.5 million), although the buzz anticipated (accurately, as was revealed) that it would sell for several times that amount. “It’s a work of art that perfectly represents the times we live in, celebrating the spectacle,” said councilor Rob Teeters a few hours before the sale.
The piece debuted in 2019 at Art Basel Miami Beach, when it was displayed at the Perrotin gallery booth. It immediately caused an uproar, with spectators piling up to such an extent that the gallery was forced to remove it to control the crowd.
All three works in the edition were sold for prices ranging from R$120,000 to R$871,000 (US$120,000 to US$150,000). One of them was subsequently donated to the Guggenheim; the other two remain in private hands.
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It wasn’t long before Cattelan’s duct-taped banana became a world-famous meme, appearing on the front page of New York Post (“Bananas!”), being posted by celebrities and turned into hats, imitations and other products.
It is also considered by many in the art world to be a legitimate work of fine art. Jason Farago, from New York Timeswrote a lengthy defense of the piece, arguing that the work “is a sculpture, which continues Cattelan’s decades-long reliance on using suspension to make the obvious seem ridiculous and to deflate and defeat the pretensions of earlier art.”
“Comedian,” Farago continued, is a continuation of Cattelan’s “willingness to implicate himself within the economic, social, and discursive systems that structure how we see and what we value.”
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The buyer on Wednesday night was acquiring a certificate of authenticity that gave him the right to manifest the piece as an official work of art, although Sotheby’s says he will also receive a banana and a roll of tape as a sort of gift. starter kit. (The work also comes with a detailed instruction manual on how it should be presented.)
When the lot was presented, participants in the crowded auction room almost uniformly raised their phones to record videos. Auctioneer Oliver Barker started the bidding at R$4.6 million (US$800,000), and at least two telephone bidders, two online, plus three in the room, quickly took the work past its high estimate in less than 20 seconds. (Puns arose—“don’t let it slip,” Barker said.) In the end, what was left was an online bidder competing against a telephone bidder.
Finally, the hammer fell at R$30 million (US$5.2 million); with auction house fees known as premiums, the final price was R$36 million (US$6.24 million). Although the result was high, it did not surpass the auction record for Cattelan’s work, set in 2016 at Christie’s New York, for a sculpture of Adolf Hitler on his knees (Him, 2001), which sold for R$99 million ($17.2 million).
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“Comedian” is not the first sale to attract attention during this year’s November mega auction week in New York. On Tuesday, a painting by surrealist René Magritte sold for just over R$703 million (US$121 million) at Christie’s, setting a world record for the artist and injecting some much-needed heat into an otherwise art market. form warm.
“It’s bringing attention to the market,” Teeters said of the “Comedian” sale. “Is it contributing to the health of the market? No, it’s not.”
Sun plans to display Cattelan’s work in his Hong Kong apartment, but unlike his paintings and sculptures, he adds, “it’s very easy to take with me—that’s the beauty of it.”
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Sun says he is willing to lend the work to “any serious industry players who want to take our artwork to display anywhere. If Elon Musk wants, I’ll let him put it on the spaceship to Mars,” concludes Sun. “The banana goes to Mars.”
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