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Enid Tsui

Chinese-born crypto entrepreneur Justin Sun live-streamed himself at The Peninsula Hong Kong hotel on Friday eating the banana from an artwork for which he paid US$6.2 million at auction in New York.
The banana was not the actual one that Sotheby’s sold him – that one was bought last week from a streetside fruit vendor outside the auction house in Manhattan.
“This one was just bought in Hong Kong,” he told the Post at the event organised by Tron, the blockchain company he founded in 2017.
Sun began by giving a long speech in Mandarin about the significance of Comedian, the artwork created by Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan in 2019.


He compared the work to the decentralised nature of cryptocurrency.
“With artworks you have to pay tax on it, and worry about insurance and security. With conceptual art you can take it anywhere you like with no restriction,” he said.
It takes the form of a banana taped to a wall with duct tape, and its three editions can be bought and sold as a certificate with instructions for its proper installation.
After that Sun peeled off the duct tape and downed the banana in a few bites.
Plates of banana-shaped cakes were then served, and the journalists in attendance were each given a banana duct-taped to a white piece of plastic.

Sun said he was pleased to see “the banana” reported all over the world after he bought it.
“Cattelan was really thoughtful. He chose to use the banana, which is the king of fruit, a fruit familiar to everyone. So it’d get more attention than if he had used the durian or mangosteen,” he said.
As soon as he bought it, the AI chatbot ChatGPT was already claiming that Comedian was among the most important works of art produced in the 21st century, and provided a 2,000 word analysis of it.

ChatGPT had obviously tapped into all the news about the auction, Sun said. “It made me realise that any artwork that is not on the internet is going to be totally irrelevant.”
Sun won a bidding war for what became the most talked-about piece in New York’s autumn art auction week. The edition of Comedian that was auctioned by Sotheby’s had changed hands three times previously and was valued at US$1 million to $1.5 million before the sale.
Later on Friday, in a talk at K11 Musea across the road from the hotel in Tsim Sha Tsui, Sun explained why he paid so much for the work.
It is hard to give a value for the banana. I asked my art adviser. She said, no price tag. We had no idea. So I set US$5 million as the maximum.
Justin Sun
He had been aware of the absurdist art work’s debut in 2019 at Art Basel Miami and it had stuck in his mind even though he knew little about it.
“A month earlier, I heard that Sotheby’s would auction it and I decided to try for it.
“It is hard to give a value for the banana. I asked my art adviser. She said, no price tag. We had no idea. The only thing we knew was that the starting bid was US$800,000 and there were seven bidders. So I gave myself a range and set US$5 million as the maximum,” he said.

In the end, the hammer price was just about that figure, but including the fees due to the auction house, he ended up paying more than US$6 million for the art concept.
For this lot, Sotheby’s accepted payment in cryptocurrencies. Sun had wanted to settle in Tron. It has nearly doubled in value since the start of the year amid a bull market for cryptocurrencies that as been spurred by US president-elect Donald Trump, who has promised a crypto-friendly administration when he enters the White House on January 20.
In the end, Sun paid in the far more stable USDC, a cryptocurrency pegged to the US dollar.

Responses to the auction were varied. Marion Maneker, author of the influential Wall Power art market newsletter, called it a “crypto world stunt” that had little to do with “serious” collecting.
Digital artist Beeple immediately created a new work showing a hooded figure, who could be the artist himself, kneeling down in front of a giant bust of Sun with a banana taped to it and surrounded by a Tron army.
Sun gained prominence in the art market when he made it known that he was the underbidder for Beeple’s Everydays: The First 5,000 Days NFT, which sold for a record US$69 million in February 2021. Later that year he bought Alberto Giacometti’s Le Nez (1947), a sculpture, for US$78 million.
The 34-year-old was born in Xining, Qinghai province, in China. He is known for headline-grabbing acts, such as winning a bid in October 2024 to become “prime minister” of Liberland, a self-declared micronation between Serbia and Croatia.
He announced on the social media platform X on Tuesday that he had invested US$30 million in Trump’s personal cryptocurrency project, World Liberty Financial, earlier this week and become an adviser to the company following the investment.
The cryptocurrency exchange HTX, which Sun fronts, has a Hong Kong affiliate which has yet to be licensed to operate in the city. In 2023 Sun was charged by the US Securities and Exchange Commission with breaching securities sale and trading rules.


Chinese-born buyer of US$6.2 million banana art eats it in Hong Kong hotel stunt

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Chinese-born cryptocurrency founder Justin Sun eats a banana artwork, composed of a fresh banana stuck to a wall with duct tape, in Hong Kong on November 29, 2024, a week after buying the provocative work of conceptual art at a New York auction for US$6.2 million. Photo: AFP

A banana artwork, Comedian, composed of a fresh banana stuck to a wall with duct tape is seen before being eaten by Chinese-born crypto founder Justin Sun in Hong Kong on November 29, 2024. Photo: AFP

Justin Sun removes the banana from the duct tape prior to eating it at The Peninsula Hong Kong hotel. Photo: AFP

Sun speaks before eating the artwork composed of a fresh banana stuck to a wall with duct tape. Photo: Matt Haldane

Sun prepares to eat the banana. Photo: AFP

Artist whose duct-taped banana sold for US$6.2 million says his work is a ‘provocation’

A woman looks at Italian visual artist Maurizio Cattelan’s duct-taped Banana entitled Comedian during a  preview ahead of its auction for US$6.2 million at Sotheby’s in New York, on November 20, 2024. Photo: AFP

People react to Maurizio Cattelan’s Comedian during an auction preview at Sotheby’s in New York. Photo: AP 

Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan in 2016. Photo: Reuters

Ishbel Myerscough, British portrait artist with show in Hong Kong, on her daughter as muse

Detail from Black Slip (2024) by Ishbel Myerscough. Photo: Handout

Ishbel (2024), a self-portrait by Ishbel Myerscough, whose debut Asian solo show of her paintings runs at Flowers Gallery in Hong Kong until January 2025.


Bella (2023), oil on canvas, by Ishbel Myerscough. 

Black Slip (2024), oil on canvas, by Ishbel Myerscough. 

Black Sofa (2024), oil on canvas, by Ishbel Myerscough. 

Daisies (2024), pencil and coloured pencil on paper, by Ishbel Myerscough. 

American artist Howardena Pindell on how racism shaped her work, now on show in Hong Kong

American artist Howardena Pindell, whose first solo exhibition in Asia is at White Cube Hong Kong until January 8, 2025. Photo: Nathan Keay

Pindell grew up in the United States during the Jim Crow era. She became the first black woman curator at New York’s Museum of Modern Art in the 1970s. Photo: Howardena Pindell

Howardena Pindell’s Tesseract 20 is part of the Deep Sea, Deep Space exhibition at White Cube Hong Kong. Photo: White Cube

Howardena Pindell’s City Lights, Night Flight features hundreds of tiny, hole-punched discs. Photo: White Cube

Howardena Pindell’s Deep Sea 8, featured in the Hong Kong exhibition, is one of the works that captures her love for the ocean. Photo: White Cube

Howardena Pindell’s Tesseract 18, featured in the exhibition. Photo: White Cube

Howardena Pindell’s Tesseract 19 (Deep Space). Pindell began her Tesseract series in 2022. Photo: White Cube

Howardena Pindell’s Untitled 31 (The Solar System Is Beige), like City Lights … Night Flight, features hundreds of tiny discs applied to canvas. Photo: White Cube

Howardena Pindell’s Tesseract 17. Photo: White Cube

Young naked women are their canvas – nude art of 2 anonymous Hong Kong artists challenges city’s conservative attitudes towards sex

Lousy’s body paint on a nude woman. The anonymous Hong Kong graffiti artist paints bold designs on young, naked women then photographs them in erotic poses. Photo: Lousy                                                         

Another of Lousy’s “kissfaces”, on Queen’s Road West in Hong Kong. Photo: Lousy

Lousy’s photobook “Yook”, published in 2020. Photo: Lousy

Matsushimaon’s body art on a nude woman. Photo: Matsushimaon

Professor Sonia Wong says there is not a lot of space in erotic or explicit artistic disciplines for women to express their sexuality, especially in Hong Kong. Photo: Professor Sonia Wong

Artist Lousy’s portrait. Photo: Lousy

Lifestyle

Arts & Culture

Cryptocurrency entrepreneur Justin Sun praises artist for creating Comedian artwork, before downing it on live stream at The Peninsula hotel


Cryptocurrency entrepreneur Justin Sun praises artist for creating Comedian artwork, before downing it on live stream at The Peninsula hotel.


Fame and celebrity

Hong Kong

Cryptocurrency