Anna Banana
Subtitle: 45 years of fooling around with A. Banana
By: Michelle Jacques, Anna Banana, Helen Marzolf, Craig Saper, Anne Thurmann-Jajes, Edward M. Gómez
Contributors: Tupper, Jon, writer of foreword; Art Gallery of Greater Victoria
Publisher: Figure.1; Art Gallery of Greater Victoria
Published: 2015
Language: eng
Number of pages: 159
ISBN-13: 9781927958292
Subjects: Bananas in art; Exhibitions
Description: "She's gone bananas! Discover one of the country's most intriguing, influential and unheralded artists in this groundbreaking retrospective of the work of Anna Banana. Widely recognized and admired in countercultural communities but overlooked by the mainstream for decades, Anna Banana has been fearlessly challenging convention as Town Fool and Doktor Anna Freud, producing parodic publications, creating and exchanging artist's stamps and other original artworks and staging banana-themed events that she documents for a network of like-minded artists around the world. It is this vibrant community of creative individuals that has both fuelled her work and embraced it, and it is their long history of communicating by mail--welcoming anyone interested in participating--that has laid the groundwork for today's social media networks. Anna Banana: 45 Years of Fooling Around with A. Banana is a compelling retrospective of the artist's work and her place in art history. Michelle Jacques traces Banana's evolution from Anne Long to conceptual artist Anna Banana and the breadth of her oeuvre. Craig Saper contemplates the paradox that an artist of her stature could remain virtually unknown while subverting mainstream art and culture so relentlessly and so humorously for so long. Anne Thurmann-Jajes relates the value of the Banana Rag and other publications in publicizing the artist's actions and maintaining contact with other artists. And Edward M. Goméz highlights the importance of Banana's fun, frank and frequently experimental art in engaging new audiences, catalyzing other artists and bridging the historic anti-art practices of Dada and Fluxus and today's contemporary practices. Like the artist herself, this remarkable book will enlighten, engage and surprise."--
Notes: Catalogue of an exhibition held at the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria from September 19, 2015 to January 3, 2016.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 141-155).
Table of contents: title: Foreword / Jon Tupper; title: Introduction / Helen Marzolf; title: When is A. Banana not a banana? / Anna Banana; title: A. Banana by any other name is A. Banana / Michell Jacques; title: The banana paradox / Craig Saper; title: Networking publications : Anna Banana and the significance of her artist's publications / Anne Thurmann-Jajes; title: Of bananas, mail art and subversive fun / Edward M. Gómez; title: Events, performances, exhibitions and collections; title: Selected bibliography; title: Notes on contributors.