Spray Painted Bananas

Chapter 17

What better place to have one’s art exhibited but in the Tate Modern along the River Thames? Well that’s not exactly an option for a nobody like me.

Or is it?

Actually, it seems it is. According to Bibiana it’s just a matter of looking purposeful and wearing a t-shirt with Tate Modern across the front.

Everyone wants a uniform and I find myself being persuaded to buy them.

‘It’s an investment,’ Bibiana says. ‘It’ll make us look like we mean business.’

I buy three t-shirts in purple and one in orange for Egg, who believes the colour will bring out the autumnal hues of his beard. I wince as the elderly female shop assistant plunges my card into the card reader.

‘Are you alright, dear?’ she asks. ‘You look like you have wind.’

‘No, I’m fine,’ I say, feeling my cheeks reddening.

‘Better out than in.’

She proceeds to talk loudly about what position I should lie in to expel unnecessary gases while she laboriously removes the t-shirts from their hangers. When I tell her I don’t need a bag, she looks positively offended.

Egg and Farrell pull their t-shirts on over what they’re already wearing while Bibiana and I head to the bathroom. There she supplies me with an official looking identity badge from the last job she worked at. I point out that not only is it for an insurance company but it also has her face on it instead of mine.

‘Just flash it quickly if there’s a problem,’ she says.

I practice a smile in the mirror and in my head I say the words I hope I won’t have to use: You don’t recognise me because I’m new, it’s my first week!

‘All okay?’ she says.

Not really. I’m about to plant an alien exhibit in one of the most famous galleries in Europe and my stomach is churning.

‘Yep, I think so.’

Outside in the foyer I find Farrell has had a change of heart.

‘It’s too risky,’ he says. ‘We’ve only got two bunches of bananas and we don’t want to lose them before we’ve even begun to interact with the public.’

‘She has to do something big and the exhibition upstairs is perfect for her work!’ Bibiana argues.

Not for the first time I wonder why they are here, encouraging me. Shouldn’t they be persuading me to go home and rethink my whole life?

‘Oh god, you make it sound so serious...’

‘Well if it’s not serious Amber, then what are we doing here?’ she snaps at me. ‘Please tell me this isn’t a prank!’

Farrell and I exchange the briefest of looks, enough to know we’re on the same page. Bibiana’s cheeks are flushed and her bosom rises and falls as if she’s been running; her kiddie-sized t-shirt is probably more constrictive than she’d care to admit. I want to laugh but instinct is telling me laughing won’t help matters.

‘You said the exhibition upstairs is perfect,’ Farrell says. 'Why?’

Bibiana tosses her hair over her shoulder with a defiant shake of the head.

‘Because the exhibition upstairs is full of penises!’

I gawp at her. ‘What do you mean?’

Now she sighs dramatically and I suppress the urge to slap her.

‘How do you want me to explain it to you better? Shapes that look like penises, penis shaped object – it’s a perfect exhibition to incorporate your bananas into. Just get up there and when no one is looking put the bananas down on the carpet of 3D penises, take a photo and leave. Do you understand?’