Multimillion-dollar banana: French museum artwork 'Comedian', eaten twice before, is now stolen

A museum in eastern France has reported to police the theft of a banana that forms the core of a multi-million dollar artwork by Italian visual artist Maurizio Cattelan, officials said on Sunday.The missing fruit, which was taped to a wall as part of the provocative work titled "Comedian", was noticed by a guard on Saturday. The Pompidou-Metz museum, a branch of the famous Pompidou Centre in Paris, said in a statement that it had lodged a criminal complaint for theft against unknown persons. The museum has since replaced the banana.It is not the first time the conceptual artwork has faced damage. Its perishable banana centrepiece is replaced every three days to keep it "contemporary." In July last year, a visitor ate the fruit, but guards quickly intervened and stuck up a replacement. Cattelan said at the time he was disappointed the hungry visitor had consumed only the banana and not the tape as well. The museum did not take legal action in that instance.This time, however, the museum decided to file a criminal complaint because the perpetrator was unidentified, and therefore "there is no possibility of dialogue." The museum also said that "this is the second time this has happened" and that it felt it was an issue of respect for the artwork.Cattelan's edible creation, which aims to question the notion of art and its value, has sparked controversy ever since it debuted at the 2019 Art Basel show in Miami Beach with an asking price of $120,000. A performance artist, David Datuna, ate "Comedian" at that 2019 show, saying he felt "hungry." But the work's value has only risen.In 2024, Chinese-born crypto founder Justin Sun paid $5.2 million for one iteration of the work, then days later ate it in front of cameras in Hong Kong.As well as "Comedian," Cattelan is known for producing an 18-carat, fully functioning gold toilet called "America" that was offered to Donald Trump during his first term in the White House. A British court in March found two men guilty of stealing it during an exhibition in 2020 from an 18th-century stately home that was the birthplace of wartime prime minister Winston Churchill. The toilet was split up into parts and none of the gold was ever recovered.