Jeremy Deller flies flag for Thomas More's Utopia, 500 years later

Giant smiley marks launch of year-long celebration of radical book, to take in everything from street art to fashion.

The bright yellow flag hoisted up the Somerset House flagpole on Monday morning bore a universally recognised symbol: the smiley. Jointly designed by the artist Jeremy Deller and the graphic designer Fraser Muggeridge, it launched a year of programming by the London venue to mark the 500th anniversary of Thomas More’s seminal work Utopia.

Celebrating its spirit of radical thinking and counterculture, the series will span the realms of fashion, art, design and literature in the largest ever celebration of More’s book. Written in 1516, Utopia envisioned a self-contained island world where society and its systems were completely equal.