What if I told you anybody could make millions right now — just by sticking fruit to a wall? Because that’s exactly what modern “art” has become.
Modern art can best be exemplified by the recently viral “Comedian:” a banana duct taped to a wall.
Oxford University defines art as “the expression or application of human creative skill and imagination … producing works to be appreciated primarily for their beauty or emotional power.”
This definition makes it easy to see that what many consider “modern art,” the contemporary trend of conceptual stunts, is, in fact, not art, but something else entirely — artistically shallow.
“Comedian” was created in 2019 by Maurizio Cattelan. Despite its simple nature and homemade feel, it has been sold a total of four times. The first three in 2019 for $120,000, $120,000 and $150,000, respectively, and finally in 2024 for — wait for it — $6.24 million. That included a certificate of authenticity and instructions for installation. It’s duct tape and a banana, how hard could it be? Still, it clearly has some appeal. After all, with such a high sticker price, it must be important to someone, right?
According to Claims Journal, ‘“Comedian” is a work of conceptual art, and the value is in the concept rather than the physical manifestation of the assembled objects.’ Imagine duct-taping a banana to a wall and trying to sell it in 2019 — even though it’s the same concept — would someone have paid $120k, or even anything at all? Probably not.
“It doesn’t take that much skill to just tape a banana onto the wall,” said junior and artist Nico Navarro. “I don’t feel any emotions from a banana.”
This leaves us with the question: why did “Comedian” sell for so much? In 2019, Maurizio Cattelan was already an established artist, whose pieces “La Nona Ora” (The Ninth Hour) and “L.O.V.E.” had earned him international acclaim in the past. The only reason Maurizio Cattelan can get away with something as artistically skillless as “Comedian” is because he tells people it has meaning. Not directly, but as an established “artist,” when he displays something, he is telling his audience that there is a deeper meaning and that they should look and listen. And they do — because of his authority in the art world.
“Because it’s popular, people started to [buy the piece],” Navarro said. “[They are buying] the status.”
It’s easy to argue that “Comedian” is satirical, and the emotions it evokes — mostly outrage — are the point; “Comedian” is profound because of its mundane materials. But this is weak. It overlooks the fact that when Cattelan was coming up with this piece, he could have taped anything to that wall, and it wouldn’t have made a difference. He was using the absurdity of how it wasn’t art to define it as art, which is self-defeating and has nothing to do with the piece itself. The “artistry” isn’t coming from the art, but something else. If Kevin Hart performs a comedy show, do we credit him or the stage he was standing on? In this case, the stunt is what matters, so why are we glorifying the piece it’s done on?
Conceptualists might argue that the idea is the art — but if the idea can be replicated by anyone, and the only difference is the fame of the artist, then the “artistry” isn’t art at all.
And it’s not just “Comedian.” “Girl With Balloon” —a traditional art piece by the anonymous artist Banksy, another art phenom — was automatically shredded upon resale as part of an “unexpected piece of performance art,” says Artsy. This demonstration is called “Love is in the Bin,” after it became worth almost 20 times its original price. The irony? Banksy shredding his work was meant to push back against the commodification of high art. Instead, because of the glorification of stunts like this, “Love is in the Bin” has only added to the problem, disrespecting Banksy’s original intention. It’s a perfect example of the out-of-touch elite glamorizing a stunt and even disregarding the meaning the artist meant for it to have. When meaning becomes secondary to spectacle, art stops being about expression and starts being about attention — and that’s not meaningful at all.
These fall short of satire because they are not making a specific comment, just exploiting shock value. When the art is in the stunt, not the work, art stops being art. These conceptual contemporary pieces are just artists making drama by trolling the art world.
If we consider pieces made by established artists meant to game the art world, we go against the creativity and skill that signify real art and turn the art world into a joke. Pieces like “Comedian” gain the most attention because of the obvious absurdity, and having this be what identifies the art world in the minds of everyday people destroys the meaning of art. So let’s stop glorifying lazy artistry and save the term ‘art’ for pieces that actually deserve it.
