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Still Life with Banana is Gavin Turk’s latest collaboration with Manifold, a continuation of the artist’s playful homage to the history of the banana in art. Turk takes the banana out of context and sets it against tonal backgrounds that evoke traditional portraiture in vivid orange, ultraviolet and warm grey.
Turk describes this series as a “minimal still life, abandoned by the rest of the fruit bowl.” He continues: “The banana, singled out and placed in a studio scene, evokes a reclining figure. There is something of a surreal effect – it’s a moment of ripeness, and the yellow colour of the banana generates Pop relationships with the different backgrounds.”
The title and image of this series reference the still life genre in the art historical canon, alluding to iconic works such as Caravaggio’s Still Life with Fruit (c.1603), Goya’s Still Life with Golden Bream (c.1808), Cézanne’s Still Life with Apples & Pears (c.1891) and Matisse’s Still Life with Geraniums (1910). The banana is a relatively recent addition to the traditional still life fruit bowl, arriving in Western homes during the Impressionist era and throughout the twentieth century, with artists such as Gauguin (1848-1903) and de Chirico (1888-1978) including bunches of bananas in their works.
