French museum reports theft of banana from Italian artist’s multimillion-dollar work

A museum in eastern France on Sunday reported to police the theft of a banana that forms a core part of a multimillion-dollar artwork by Italian visual artist Maurizio Cattelan.

The missing fruit – which was taped to a wall to form the provocative work by Cattelan called “Comedian” – was noticed by a guard on Saturday to have gone missing.

The Pompidou-Metz museum in Lorraine, which is a branch of the famous Pompidou Centre in Paris, said in a statement it had lodged a criminal complaint for theft against persons unknown.

It also said it had replaced the banana.

The artwork’s perishable banana centrepiece is replaced every three days to keep it contemporary.

In July last year, a visitor to the museum ate the fruit. But guards quickly intervened and stuck up a replacement banana.