Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan, best known for the viral $6.2 million duct-taped banana, is putting another headline-grabbing piece on the auction block, this time, a fully functional toilet made entirely of solid gold.
Sotheby’s announced plans to auction the 18-karat sculpture, titled America, with opening bids set at around $10 million. The 223-pound toilet will be displayed inside the auction house’s Manhattan headquarters ahead of its November 18 sale, though visitors will only be allowed to view, not use, the piece.
“We don’t want people sitting on the art,” Sotheby’s specialist David Galperin told the Wall Street Journal, confirming that cryptocurrency will also be accepted in the auction.
Golden Toilet to fetch $10million at auction
Created in 2016, America was Cattelan’s commentary on wealth, privilege, and the absurdity of value in modern art, a theme he’s explored since Comedian, his duct-taped banana installation, became a cultural phenomenon. Cattelan said he wanted to place “something shiny and expensive in an overlooked spot,” adding that “in the end, we are all the same, and we remember it right there, in the least noble and most necessary place.”
The first version of America debuted at New York’s Guggenheim Museum, where visitors could actually use it under staff supervision. A later version, installed at England’s Blenheim Palace in 2019, was infamously stolen and never recovered, with investigators believing it was melted down for its gold value.
The toilet’s current owner, a private collector who purchased it in 2017, is now testing whether satire still sells — and if Cattelan’s commentary on excess can fetch more than its literal weight in gold.
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