Image via Reuben Dangoor
If you’ve been on social media at all in the last few days, you’ve definitely already seen Reuben Dangoor’s portraits of grime legends as landed gentry—Skepta on a white horse waving the Union Jack, Stormzy in a regal manor with a Wiley portrait hanging above the fireplace, and Newham General D Double E as an actual general. Part of a series entitled ‘Legends of the Scene’, they’ve got mad love from both the internet and the artists themselves, so we grabbed five minutes with Reuben to talk about his masterpieces.
Where did the idea for the series come from?
Initially I thought a white horse would go with Skepta’s all-white ensemble, I thought it would be a funny image. But then as I started putting things together I thought this would be a really good series. I just started to combine a few of the stereotypical views of England and old school Britishness, with these guys—I think they’re flying the flag for the UK in a way that’s far more relevant. As grime gets bigger and bigger, you get people from overseas looking at it. I started coming up with more and more, it was so rich, there was so much material to start crossing over between them. Whoever the grime character is, all their attributes and referencing their songs, the way they dress, and trying to mirror that with something that’s historical. It started off as a very small idea, and then it grew.
Are you an old school grime fan then?
Absolutely. UK garage and grime are my background. I was into UK garage when I was much younger, and I had friends and older brothers who were on pirate radio stations, so we’d go down and listen to sets and stuff. It was a huge part of me growing up. I never stopped enjoying it, but it felt like there was kind of a lull where there wasn’t really much fresh material coming out—but there’s more pride in it now, in the movement.
You’ve done Skepta and D Double E, and those guys have been their since the beginning, but Stormzy is a new guy—do you think he deserves to be up there as well?
I wasn’t going to put him on alone; he pays respect to Wiley so I put Wiley in the picture as well. There will also be a solo Wiley piece, I’m working on that at the moment. It felt like Stormzy is taking it in a new direction, but he has his roots very much in the heritage of grime. He’s doing really positive things for the scene and he’s got a huge following. I think he will be a guy who will be remembered in the same way as people like Skepta
What’s the reaction been like from the artists?
It’s been very positive. Stormzy had it as his profile picture for a little while. Wiley put it on his Instragram, Skepta put it on his Instagram, and D Double E put it on his. It was pretty crazy. They’ve all reached out and said it was pretty cool.
Any chance you’d do a mixtape cover or an album cover for them?
Yeah, that might be pretty fun, there might be something coming!
Who are you doing next?
Wiley will probably be the next one. There’s another one that’s a little bit leftfield, I dunno if its part of the scene, but I’ve got a good idea for Mike Skinner. He’s not strictly grime or garage, but he’s definitely important. But there’s a lot. There’s about 12 or 15 so far, some more done than others, but they’re all being worked on simultaneous.
What are you listening to as you paint them?
Normally I listen to the artist I’m working on. I’ll just go through albums, or their Soundcloud, to give me a bit of inspiration and motivation. Sometimes you just pick-up on odd lyrics—the D Double E one is a pretty good example. Newham Generals, playing on that, and he had the ‘Streetfighter’ song, so I gave him a badge of honour with the Street Fighter logo.
You work for Rockstar Games, right? That’s pretty cool—can you tell us about new games you’re working on?
That’s my day job, I’m a designer for them. They have really strict NDAs though, so apart from telling you that I work for them, they’ll bury me in the ground if I say anything more than that!
Check out more of Reuben’s work on his website and on his Instagram, and follow him on Twitter.
