Quarantine Art: Lockdown Made This Woman Start Banana Art, Now She is a Global Sensation

Quarantine Art: Lockdown Made This Woman Start Banana Art, Now She is a Global Sensation

When London-based Anna Chojnicka, 35, got bored to her bone while in quarantine as a precaution against a suspected COVID-19 infection risk, she took to punching lines and patterns on the bananas she was meant to eat to balance her body nutrients. At that moment when she thought she was only doing something mundane to kill time, she was actually laying the groundwork for another quarantine art form that will get her international following and make her an Instagram star.

Chojnicka’s absent-minded activity of running her fork along the outside of the peel has resulted in what can best be described as bruised banana art. The art form grew from dark lines and doodles on the banana skin, forming abstract patterns and profiles in shadows, to full sketches of an Ethiopian coffee pot, a giraffe, and a rocket launching into space.

As the allure of the new art form struck her, there was no going back and she explored how far she can go with her creative discovery. She started making pictures that were more and more intricate using the same method — only pressure, no paint – and posting them on her Twitter and Instagram pages, which in no time attracted art lovers from all over the world.

 “This is a bizarre symptom of the pandemic … creating banana art,” she said in reference to her odd medium.

Soon she began posting daily pictures on her now famously known “banana bruiser” social media handles. Her array of banana art has included sketches of familiar cartoons such as Homer Simpson, expertly rendered portraits of people such as this collection of women from around the world and the viral Bernie Sanders inauguration day meme, typography art like the “Empowered women empower women” piece nestled in a yin-yang of two women in profile on a banana peel, pun art like a zipper around a partially peeled banana, current events sketches such as a sketch of the coronavirus vaccine and of US President Joe Biden and his vice president Kamala Harris.

Among her most popular pieces was a banana art piece she made in February scrawled with the word “banana” written in different languages on it. “What language(s) do you speak? Do you see your language here?” she asked in the Instagram caption of the picture. Responses flooded in from all over the world, and the post ended up “sparking separate conversations between people around the commonalities in their languages,” Chojnicka said.

She has also used her peculiar art form and its global following for charity and humanitarian purposes. With the help of her social media followers, she has raised about $1,600 for FareShare, a charity in the United Kingdom that provides food to people in need.

Having previously worked in Ethiopia for four years, she has also used her banana art to help bring attention to the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, which aims to address the country’s energy shortage, a project Chojnicka she said has "the potential to lift people out of poverty.”

Furthermore, she’s started online classes teaching others the delicate craft of banana sketches and even held a workshop for a charity recently that supports elderly community members who are often in isolation and suffering from loneliness. 

The activity, she noted, has both social and therapeutic components: “You’re bruising the bananas together, but you can also use the time to just talk and have a chat, and it develops mindfulness and creativity.”

In a chat with Washington Post, Chojnicka revealed the process of creating her quirky quarantine art for enthusiasts who might want to re-create the art form.

To begin, you need a banana and a tool to bruise — not pierce — the peel. Chojnicka said she uses a seam ripper, an instrument used by sewers to rip out stitches, but any blunt point, such as a comb or a toothpick, will work. For beginners, she recommends sketching a relatively simple image with at most three shades and drawing the darkest part first - “which quite often will be the outline to whatever your image is,” she explained - and leaving that to turn as dark as you want it before moving on to your middle shade. The lightest shade will come last. When you’re satisfied with the drawing, take a picture fast. Because the banana continues to brown once the peel has been damaged, often the image can look quite different within minutes.

“Softer bananas tend to be more even in how they bruise, so you can do things that look almost blended,” she said. On the other hand, the bruising in harder bananas yields a more mottled, almost grainy effect.

“Bananas have a really beautiful way of going from yellow to black by way of gold, orange, and brown,” she added. “Some of it almost looks pink.”

According to Chojnicka, she had liked art as a child but hadn’t practiced it much as an adult until last year when the pandemic locked her up at her London home for months. And since she discovered the fun and purposefulness of banana art, she hasn’t “missed a day,” even as she knows she “can’t keep that up forever.” 

For now, she inspects her daily sketch, takes a photo, and then eats the banana as she doesn’t like waste.

bruised banana art
 bruised banana art
 bruised banana art

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