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John Dugger (1948-Present) is an American artist whose sculptures and projects of the 1960s explored participation as an art form. Dugger later went on to create banners with subjects as diverse as the Black Panthers and the Olympic Games.
Dugger, was born in Los Angeles, California in 1948. He studied at the Gilmore Art Institute in Kalamazoo, Michigan and at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago before moving to London in 1967. His work is best known in Europe where he has spent a large part of his career. In London, Dugger worked with avant-garde groups such as Exploding Galaxy and exhibited alongside other expatriates such as Lygia Clark and Helio Oiticica. His interest in Participation Art lead him to create artist multiples, interactive art objects, and happenings which were shown and took place at high-profile spaces in Europe including the Institute for Contemporary Art and the Whitechapel Gallery, London. In 1972, Dugger and fellow artist David Medalla, were given a pavilion by Harald Szeemann at Documenta 5, in which they created the People’s Participation Pavilion.
In the 1970s Dugger began making banners, a practice that at that time was more closely associated with craft, politics, and trade, than with contemporary art. His first banner was displayed from Nelson’s Column in Trafalgar Square during a protest of the military dictatorship in Chile. Dugger considers his banners an evolution of his participation art, where “it is not the public that participates with the artwork but the artwork that participates with the public”, [1] making the context in which the banners are displayed as important as the banners themselves. The people and activities taking place within the space are thought to activate and bring the banners to their full potential.
In the 1980s Dugger began mountain climbing, which would influence the direction of his work. Dugger’s mountain banners are large geometric tapestries with detailed drawings of mountains, which are taken from on-site drawings made during his climbs. The drawings are then transferred onto black canvas using a dye-discharge process and attached to a larger piece of fabric, which is often a piece of colorful Cordura fabric, a nylon fabric frequently used in performance apparel.[2] The mountain banners are then hung using mountain rigging designed by the artist. Dugger’s interest in travel and banners led him to study banner making at the Namgyal Monastery in Dharmasala, India alongside the banner maker to the Dalai Lama.
In the evolution of his banner making Dugger has created banners that have been displayed in political, athletic, theatrical, commercial and domestic spaces. He has created banners for the Dali Lama, the Black Panthers, The Queen of England, The Clash and the Olympic Games. His work is frequently written about in relationship to the radical British art of the 1960s. Dugger’s work has been collected by such prominent institutions such as the Tate Museum, London. Dugger is currently based in Berkeley, California.