Bananas in art: a short history of the salacious, disturbing and censored fruit

Natalia LL’s 1973 artwork of a model sucking on a banana has been taken down by Poland’s rightwing government. But bananas aren’t just suggestive – they can be subversive, too

Bananas are not the only fruit but in art they are the most outrageous. The rightwing government of Poland has taken such exception to a 1973 video and photowork of a model sucking on a banana by Natalia LL that last week it was removed from display at Warsaw’s National Museum. But Natalia LL is not alone. Artists have been aroused and even troubled by this suggestively shaped fruit for more than a century. The real question here is: why has a woman been censored for getting off on bananas when men have been at it so long?

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