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Artist Handwrites Entire Scripts to Create Unique Portraits of Movie Characters

The Princess Bride
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Many art mediums require plenty of patience and concentration, but artist Mike Matola shows a whole new level of creative endurance. He creates pop-culture posters by handwriting entire scripts and song lyrics to form the images. By drawing upon the positive and negative space, each silhouetted word art portrait is brought to life, line by line.

Matola’s collection of typography posters include handwritten depictions of popular actors, musicians, and fictional characters. Freddy Mercury is comprised entirely from Queen’s Best Of album lyrics, while Buttercup and Westley from The Princess Bride are composed of the words from the movie’s entire script. Each piece can take up to 80 hours to complete, showcasing Matola’s incredible commitment to his art. For one particularly impressive My Neighbor Totoro-inspired design, Matola spent 6 months writing the entire script in its original Japanese language.

Matola explains, “The poster was made by sitting down and writing out each word with a pen, line by line, down the page and increasing and decreasing the space between the letters until the portrait emerged.” Similar to a pointillism painting, from afar the hand-written typography blends together to create the image. Up close, the viewer can see countless tiny characters in black ink, sprawled across the page.

You can see more from Matola’s growing portfolio and purchase his poster designs on Etsy.

Artist Mike Matola creates pop-culture-inspired typography posters by handwriting entire scripts and song lyrics to form the images.

The Princess Bride

Typography Posters by Mike Matola

The Princess Bride (detail)

Typography Posters by Mike Matola

The Princess Bride (detail)

By drawing upon the positive and negative space, each silhouetted word out portrait is brought to life, line by line.

Typography Posters by Mike Matola

Adele

Typography Posters by Mike Matola

Adele (detail)

Typography Posters by Mike Matola

Jurassic Park

Typography Posters by Mike Matola

Jurassic Park (detail)

Each impressive design can take up to 80 hours to complete.

Typography Posters by Mike Matola

Childish Gambino

Typography Posters by Mike Matola

Childish Gambino (detail)

Typography Posters by Mike Matola

Totoro

Typography Posters by Mike Matola

Totoro (detail)

Typography Posters by Mike Matola

Totoro (detail)

Typography Posters by Mike Matola

Foo Fighters

Typography Posters by Mike Matola

Foo Fighters (detail)

Typography Posters by Mike Matola

Foo Fighters (detail)

Typography Posters by Mike Matola

Pulp Fiction

Typography Posters by Mike Matola

Pulp Fiction (detail)

Typography Posters by Mike Matola

Pearl Jam

Typography Posters by Mike Matola

Pearl Jam (detail)

Typography Posters by Mike Matola

Pearl Jam (detail)

Queen

Typography Posters by Mike Matola

Queen (detail)

Typography Posters by Mike Matola

Queen (detail)

Typography Posters by Mike Matola

Queen (detail)

Typography Posters by Mike Matola

Mike Matola: Website | Facebook | Instagram | Twitter | Etsy

My Modern Met granted permission to use photos by Mike Matola.

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Emma Taggart

Emma Taggart is a Contributing Writer at My Modern Met. Originally from Northern Ireland, she is an artist now based in Berlin. After graduating with a BA in Fashion and Textile Design in 2013, Emma decided to combine her love of art with her passion for writing. Emma has contributed to various art and culture publications, with an aim to promote and share the work of inspiring modern creatives. While she writes every day, she’s also devoted to her own creative outlet—Emma hand-draws illustrations and is currently learning 2D animation.
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