The Machinery of Night

Où sont les bananes d'antan?

Time flies like an arrow.
Fruit flies like a banana.

-- Groucho Marx

And an artist flies like a thief in the night.

This is rich. Does anyone remember the long ago, heady days of 2007, when we were menaced by the threat of giant bananas over Texas? A giant banana, made from wood and paper, was supposed to be launched by a Argentinian artist César Saëz from Mexico, with funding from Canada. His lucid rationale, at the time, was this:

It is in Texas because it has oil,
and a lot of Walmarts, Exxons and
Halliburtons. (and the Ranch)

It is a buffoon act, trying to impress...
Texan dominant Aerospace,
and all the Gun Clubs.

Which I trust is inarguable.

He also said:

"It's an artistic statement and a spectacle. One thing I love is the issue of truth or hoax, and I love the ambiguity."

I hope it will come as a surprise to no one that "hoax" was the operative word here, in that the Canadians never saw their banana. Never saw their money back either. The link above has the gory details, in the form of a radio interview with a couple of arts types. (English transcript, link to French original.)

The sophisticated arts commissariot is not too upset over the disappearance of $130 -- ONE HUNDRED AND THIRTY -- grand that this clown received. After all, he had to do research. He had to talk to people. He had to renew himself as an artist.

He did not, however, actually have to produce a banana.

You'll see that I kinda sorta predicted this in my original post. The "art" was the controversy over the project, not the damned banana. Ha ha! He got all you rubes in an uproar! ka-CHING!

Via Mark Steyn.