Maurizio Cattelan, the great Italian conceptual prankster who framed a banana and plumbed in a precious loo, explains why he’s now blasting huge holes into sheets of gold
‘For a long time,” says Maurizio Cattelan, “I wanted to do something with gunshots. It was my obsession.” His original idea, back in the 90s, was to have a shooter fire rounds at him as he stood behind bulletproof glass. This was to take place in front of an audience. “The idea was there,” he says. “But it was insane.”
We should not be too surprised. The controversial Italian conceptualist has made headlines in recent years by taping a banana to a wall (and selling it for a fortune), smashing a meteor into the pope (or his likeness), and plumbing a gold toilet into Oxfordshire’s Blenheim Palace (which was then nicked). All in the name of high art satire. Cattelan’s work is direct, confrontational, obvious and brutally in your face. And now, in a small show at Gagosian in Mayfair, he has revisited that 90s notion – and blasted huge holes into sheets of gold with a pump-action shotgun.
