Kelly P Hensen

How to Grow a Banana (2019)
found wood, mixed media
18 x 17 x 6 in.

Ever since I was little I have wondered where the seed was in a banana – all fruit have seeds inside. So I researched it and found that the modern-day Cavendish bananas are triploids – which means they are sterile and produce no seeds. The only way to grow the next generation of Cavendish bananas is to rely on a robust amount of suckers or to clone the plant material.

The piece is constructed to imitate the way we receive information – lots of little windows of pictures and words. All of the images and words on the piece are scientifically correct. The beaker with the banana growing in it is fake. You can’t grow a banana that way. Will the viewer accept this as a truth in a museum-like display of “facts”?

© Kelly P Hensen