Wilfred Limonious: the Jamaican illustrator who defined dancehall art

In Fine Style is the first book to explore the illustration and design work of Jamaican artist Wilfred Limonious, known as the father of dancehall art. Here, the book’s editor and One Love Books founder Al “Fingers” Newman writes about Limonious’ career and work that came to visually define a seminal era in Jamaican culture.

Wilfred Limonious (née Lemonious) was born in 1949 near Albert Town, Trelawny parish, a rural area of Jamaica at the edge of Cockpit Country, the island’s largest remaining area of natural rainforest. The eldest of seven children he was obsessed with drawing from an early age, doodling anywhere and everywhere he could. He loved sketching people especially and would produce portraits in a matter of minutes. His brother Bruce remembers the entire family house – the walls and doors – being covered in Wilfred’s drawings, and while their father was a strict man, he never complained about it. This support is likely to have played an important role in encouraging Limonious to pursue a path in the arts.

His professional career began in 1970 when his single-frame cartoons were published in the Laugh With Us section of the Jamaican newspaper The Star, a full page of comics that gave local artists the chance to be published alongside established international cartoonists. Limonious went on to create a number of comics for the Jamaican newspapers including Amos, Shane and Shawn, Grass Root, Earth Runnings and the popular three-panel strip, Chicken. He made a name for himself as a cartoonist on the island, and while outside of Jamaica Limonious is associated mainly with LP covers, many Jamaicans remember him more as a newspaper cartoonist than as an album cover designer.

In the mid-1970s he began working in-house for the government-run adult-literacy programme JAMAL (the Jamaican Movement for the Advancement of Literacy), as illustrator of their publications. As well as being an artist he was also a keen musician and songwriter, and while at JAMAL he recorded the song Young Love at Channel One studio, which he self-released on seven-inch single on his own Wax label. After JAMAL he travelled to the UK where he studied for a short time at the Barking College of Technology. Unfortunately, not much is known about his time in England.

On returning to Jamaica in the early 1980s a new musical movement was taking hold on the island, which eventually became known as dancehall. Limonious was presented with an opportunity to illustrate the LP jacket for Jah Thomas’ Shoulder Move LP, which came out on Thomas’ own label, Midnight Rock, in 1983. The album, which was printed at Xpress Litho printers, was overseen by Neville Lee who owned Sonic Sounds record label, pressing plant and distribution HQ. The cover featured a photograph on the front overlaid with some hand-drawn type by Limonious, and a cartoon illustration on the back. It was something new and fresh, and producers began requesting Limonious for their sleeves.

Realising he was on to something, Neville Lee initially kept the artist’s identity a secret, so that producers who wanted a Limonious cover had to go through Sonic Sounds. After a while though, word got out and before long many of Jamaica’s best labels and producers were working with the artist – George Phang’s Powerhouse, Winston Riley’s Techniques, Coxsone Dodd’s Studio One, Prince Jazzbo’s Ujama and Dennis Hayles’s Dennis Star International to name a few. Whereas his early covers had photographs on the front and cartoons on the back, the cartoons proved so popular they were soon promoted to centre stage.

His style was unique, and managed to perfectly embody the spirit of the music inside the sleeve – vibrant, humorous and often outrageous. Limonious also had a keen eye for typography, and developed a few of his own distinctive hand-drawn typefaces, including a cursive face with little chunks taken out of it, as can be seen on albums such as Early B’s Four Wheel No Real and Sugar Minott’s Buy Off The Bar. He would also draw existing typefaces by hand, and seemed especially fond of Dynamo Bold, which features on may of his LP covers including Frankie Paul’s Shut Up Bway, Michael Prophet’s Loving You and Dennis Star’s Labrish albums.

Producer Ossie Thomas worked closely with Limonious on many of the LP jackets for his labels who ran the record labels Black Solidarity and Scar Face Records, and remembers him as being one of the fastest designers in the industry, often completing album jackets in less than a day. This, combined with the high demand for his work, meant that Limonious produced a very large body of work – close to 300 album covers, if not more. On top of this he was also responsible for a variety of record label logos, although these are more difficult to identify as designers would not typically sign off label designs, so it’s necessary to become familiar with Limonious’ signature styles to spot one of his 7" labels, for example.

Wilfred Limonious died in 1999, aged 50, leaving behind an extensive body of work that continues to inspire and entertain today. Perhaps most notably his work inspired the look of chart-topping electronic music group Major Lazer, whose cartoon aesthetic is illustrated by UK-based artist Ferry Gouw. Diplo, who founded the group, sums up Limonious’ appeal and ability: "Limonious’ style created a unique universe out of everyday Jamaican life, making it into something fantastic and epic”. Hopefully this book will go some way towards ensuring that Limonious’ talent is more widely recognised, and his name and legacy remembered for many years to come.

In Fine Style by Christopher Bateman and Al Newman is out now, supported by Arts Council England. The official launch events will take place at Rough Trade East (London) on 1 September and Rough Trade New York on 5 September.