The American artist John Dugger, who has died aged 74, engaged with the avant garde soon after arriving in London in 1967. A co-founder of the radical Artists Liberation Front and Artists for Democracy, he was an early exponent of participatory art – with his People’s Participation Pavilion being constructed for Documenta 5, in Kassel in 1972 – and a pioneer of political banners, which he later said were a form of “social media before social media”.
Dugger produced the banner Chile Vencerá ( “Chile will win”) displayed on Nelson’s Column in Trafalgar Square, in September 1974, for a rally organised by British trade unions and the Chilean Solidarity Campaign to protest against the military coup in Chile the previous year. In 1976, his banner A Vitória É Certa (“Victory is certain”), celebrating the founding of the People’s Republic of Angola, was shown in California, and members of the Black Panthers were photographed seated in front of it.
