Fruit Pie: Self-Portrait as Anita Bryant
2014, 3 minute participatory performance
SCA Contemporary, Albuquerque, NM
Photography: Stefan jennings Batista
Xerox prints/Artist book 8.5 x 5.5in, 32 pages, 24 images.
2018, first printing ed. of 6
2019, second printing & campaign button ed. of 30
2020. Third printing & campaign button ed. of 30
2021. Fourth printing & campaign button ed. of 30 [available]
Anita Bryant is known for her singing voice, starring in orange juice commercials for the Florida Citrus Commission, and her anti-gay political activism. In 1977 Anita led a successful campaign to repeal an ordinance prohibiting discrimination based on sexual orientation in Dade County, Florida, leading to successful repeals of similar local anti-discrimination ordinances around the United States. At a later televised press conference in Des Moines, Iowa regarding her political actions, Anita was “pied” in the face by protestor Thom Higgins. She quipped, “Well at least it’s a fruit pie,” marking the first recorded instance of a pieing as an act of political protest. Fruit Pie: Self-Portrait as Anita Bryant is a participatory re-staging of the Des Moines, Iowa press conference.
PUBLIC COLLECTIONS:
Museum of Modern Art Research Library (Artists’ Books)