Artist eats $120,000 banana at exhibition

A performance artist shocked a crowd at the Art Basel show in Miami by eating a very expensive snack: an art exhibit that had already been sold for US$ 120,000.

The exhibit, a banana duct-taped to the wall at Galerie Perrotin, was a work by Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan titled “Comedian,” and had already been sold to a French collector.

David Datuna, a self-described “Georgian-born American artist living in New York,” posted a video on Instagram in which he walks up to the banana, pulls it off the wall with the duct tape attached, and eats it.

“Art performance … hungry artist,” he says as he peels the fruit and takes a bite.

“Thank you, very good,” he says in the video.

Gallery guests can be heard laughing before staff whisk Datuna away for questioning.

But the commotion was resolved without a food fight, according to The Miami Herald.

“He did not destroy the art work. The banana is the idea,” the director of museum relations Lucien Terras told reporters.

“The value of the work is in the certificate of authenticity. The banana is meant to be replaced.”

A replacement banana was taped to the wall about 15 minutes after the stunt.

“This has brought a lot of tension and attention to the booth and we’re not into spectacles. But the response has been great. It brings a smile to a lot of people’s faces.”

Cattelan is best known for a fully functional 18 carat gold toilet titled “America” which he offered to lend to US President Donald Trump.

Valued at 5-6 million dollars, the toilet was in the news in September when it was stolen from Britain’s Blenheim Palace, the birthplace of Winston Churchill.

SOURCE: Bangkok Post