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Anna Banana fonds
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Anna Banana fonds

  • RBSC-ARC-1845
  • Fonds
  • 1964-2020

Fonds contains materials arising from Anna Banana’s activities in the Mail Art network, her collecting of published materials and artworks, her performance art, exhibitions of her work and others, promotion of her activities, the production of various publications including VILE magazine, and the creation of visual art including artist trading cards, artistamps, collage, drawings and paintings. Materials were created in Victoria and Vancouver from 1964-1973, San Francisco from 1973 to 1982, Vancouver from 1982 to 1995 and the Sunshine Coast from 1995 to 2020, as well as on various tours and travels throughout this whole period. Materials are often focused on the neodadaist movements of San Francisco in the 1970s and beyond, as well as involvement in the Mail Art Network and performance art, and Anna’s personal and professional life.

The fonds is divided into 10 series: Mail art and correspondence, Interactive/performance art, Anna Banana’s publications, Artworks, Artist Trading Cards, Artistamps, Exhibitions, Photographs, Press, Collected publications. Records include textual materials, particularly letters, postcards, books, periodicals, zines, and other published materials; graphic materials such as envelope art, photographs, collage, xerox art, ink and pencil drawings, and watercolour; and other items such as CDs, DVDs, and various artefacts.

Banana, Anna

Mail art and correspondence

Series is made up of correspondence and mail-art related items received and collected by Anna Banana from the late 1960’s to the 2000s. The series reflects Banana’s involvement in the Mail Art movement (through what was then called the Mail Art Network – referring to a global network of artists who communicate through the post as an act of decentralization of artistic communication among the arts community) as well as her own personal mail. Beginning in the mid 60’s, mail art was a movement inspired by the Dadaists and futurists of the early 20th century, and made popular by notable artists such as Ray Johnson, as well as artist groups such as Image Bank and the New York Correspondence School. It remains a highly collaborative and decentralized global movement, with artists like Banana sending out, receiving, and manipulating artworks through the mail. It focuses on small form artworks, including rubber stamps, artistamps, decoration and adornment of letters and envelopes, chain mail and other creative forms.

Subject matter includes mail-art received through the Mail Art Network, personal mail to friends and family, and collected invitations to participate in mail art shows, publications and magazines, as well as catalogues of artists displayed in mail art shows, publications and magazines. Media in this series varies greatly due to the nature of the mail art movement, and the lines between textual and graphic records are blurred, so that many letters, envelopes and other classically textual mediums are often decorated with the use of paints, stamps, drawings, collage and other mixed media.

The series is arranged into 11 subseries using Banana’s existing filing system: Original mail art network, 1990s Mail art (Part 1), 1990s Mail art (Part 2), Mail art Fin de Siecle 2000, 2000s Mail art (Part 1), 2000s Mail art (Part 2), Mail art final years, Personal mail, Mail art show and publication invitations and catalogues, Unfiled mail, and Envelopes.

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