Artpool Art Research Center

ANNA BANANA AT ARTPOOL – joint projects, collaborations

01 december 2024

ANNA BANANA (1940-2024)

Canadian Mail Art artist, performer and bananologist

Anna Banana was among the first with whom the founders of Artpool – György Galántai and Júlia Klaniczay – had a personal relationship in the liberating world of Dada, Mail Art and Fluxus.

Their personal meeting in 1978 led to the foundation of Artpool through an interplay of chance events. You can read more about this in the previous chapter:

Júlia Klaniczay: 1978 – Anna Banana and the Birth of Artpool

We bid farewell to a very old colleague and dear friend, with whom we shared a living artistic partnership for 45 years. She participated in many of our projects, and the Artpool archives and collections preserve numerous works and documents from her.

Below, we recall the key episodes in the collaboration between Anna Banana and Artpool, the exhibitions realised with her participation, and her guest appearances there. (Before the change in the political system, until 1991, Artpool events were held at various locations, called Artpool Periodic Spaces /APS/.)

Projects with Anna Banana between 1979 and 1991

Mailed Art, 1980 (APS no. 4.) – Artpool’s first Mail Art exhibition after its foundation in 1979, held in the Club of Young Artists and organised as part of the series of private events titled "The Culture of the Seventies".

Envelopes, letter works, postcards, artist’s stamps, etc. by 3-400 artists from 24 countries were exhibited (call for projects)

World World x Art x Post, 1982 (APS no. 6.) – Artpool’s first artist’s stamp project (→ call for the project), which resulted in an exhibition in the Fészek Club (756 stamp designs by 550 artists from 35 countries, sheets of artist’s stamps as well as envelopes and postcards made using artist’s stamps), a special album of stamps along with major theoretical essays, and a Stamp Film, which was made using the submitted projects and debuted at the Artistampex in Canada

Anna Banana’s letter about the World x Art x Post catalogue and the VILE magazines, which were not allowed to be imported to Hungary:

Buda Ray University / Budai Fénysugár Egyetem, 1982–1988 – György Galántai’s network project based on his correspondence with Ray Johnson between 1982 and 1988. Over the years, the number of artists who joined the project reached 580.

Anna Banana was among the first to respond to the “Please add to and return!" request.

Using the posted works, György Galántai organised numerous exhibitions over the years.

BÉLYEGKÉPEK / STAMP IMAGES, 1987 – The first major museum exhibition of artist‑stamps in Budapest, held at the Museum of Fine Arts based on Artpool’s vast collection, built since 1982.

The exhibition included numerous stamp sheets by Anna Banana.

Projects with Anna Banana from 1992

After a decade of illegal underground activity and the political transition, Artpool continued its work as a non-profit institution in 1992.
As an NGO, it opened its archives to the general public in the heart of Budapest, on the prestigious Liszt Ferenc Square, with the support of the City of Budapest.

For three decades starting in 1992, the Artpool Art Research Center organised numerous international projects, curated by György Galántai, most of which featured Anna Banana.

Anna Banana appeared as a personal guest of Artpool with her banana-themed projects on two occasions, in 1993 and in 2009.

1992

Stamp Sheets by the Network 1976–1992, Artpool Art Research Center
Exhibition exclusively of collective stamp sheets by the Artistamp Museum of Artpool

Buda Ray University 1982–1988, Artpool Art Research Center
Ray Johnson’s first letter, Artpool project with 76 participants, among them Anna Banana.

FLUXUS FLAGS – open-air exhibition organised by the Artpool Art Research Center (curator: György Galántai), Budapest Autumn Festival

Upon Artpool’s call, 46 artists, including Eric Andersen, Joël Hubaut, Shozo Shimamoto, Bern Porter, Endre Tót and Anna Banana, each sent a fluxus flag.

These flags flew on the lamp-posts of Liszt Ferenc Square and wires strung between them throughout the Festival, also providing a framework for further Artpool events there.

Cover of the artist’s book catalogue of the *FLUX FLAG* exhibition

1993

BANANA CONSCIOUSNESS – video projection and workshop at the Artpool Art Research Center

“Anna Banana is an American-Canadian artist-performer and bananologist. Budapest is the 25th stop of her European tour. As a guest of Artpool, she presents videotapes of the 1975 and 1980 Banana Olympics. She talks about the present state of research on the banana syndrome and presents, for the first time in Hungary, the Bananaskin-Rorschach Test. … She conducts scientific banana research among the audience based on the Rorschach test, which explores new psychological depths.”

Video of the event

Poster of the *Banana Consciousness* event

What are bananas good for? – Bálint Szombathy’s interview with Anna Banana at Artpool on 9 October 1993, before the Banana Consciousness event.

1994

NETWORKER POST (1992-94) · HÁLÓZATI POSTA (1992-94)

1995 – THE YEAR OF PERFORMANCE AT ARTPOOL

INTERNATIONAL PERFORMANCE VIDEO FESTIVAL (Newkapolcs Gallery) and
VIDEO EXPEDITION IN THE PERFORMANCE WORLD (Artpool, Budapest Autumn Festival)

Numerous artists, including Anna Banana, sent several video documents to the Artpool archive for the video performance project organised in The Year of Performance. These were either screened at the two video festivals or were available to be viewed à la carte.

We digitalised Artpool’s video collection between 2004 and 2006.
The list of researchable DVDs is available here

Anna Banana’s videos in Artpool’s video collection: