Neo Chon Teck is the last of his kind in Singapore.

The traditional movie canvas painter started out in the 1960s and has since produced a steady slew of larger-than-life movie posters. Up until the ’80s, he painted around 20 posters a week.

But technology and inevitable modernisation have rendered these works of cinematic art largely redundant.

Although today’s digital prints are of “better quality”, the movie murals are “more sentimental and precious, since they were all hand-painted”, the artist - now in his early 60s - said in an interview with TODAY newspaper.

Though he is retired, Neo’s work still lives on.

Local filmmaker Eric Khoo, who has lovingly kept the movie canvases from his films Mee Pok Man and 12 Storeys, enlisted Neo’s help to paint the poster for his 2008 Cannes Film Festival contender My Magic.

Berlin-based Singaporean artist Ming Wong, (an Singapore Internationale grants recipient) also commissioned him to make posters for the Singapore pavilion at the 2009 Venice Biennale.

Ming’s installation, Ming Wong: Life of Imitation, which explored the gradual disappearance of hand-painted movie billboards in Singapore, went on to win the Special Jury Mention Award.

* This article was first published in Singapore Magazine (Oct-Dec 2011 issue).