Thank You
For the Music

A celebration of music and lettering.

A Web Site Focused on Stylewriting and Music.

I love graffiti and how to represent letters with it. I am also a huge fan of music.
This here is a very personal project reflecting the relations between these two.

The Persona.

Graffiti writer and music enthusiast from Helsinki, Finland.
Author of coloring books “Somehow, Satan Got Behind Me”
and “Who Made Who | ACTON — Style Exchange”.

Bald and bearded person inside a room that is painted with graffiti.
Graffiti Writer

I love painting letters rather than cartoon-like characters or other representational art. Some call this stylewriting, and so do I. And that's what I've been doing since the early 90's, long before my transition to artist.

Artist

Artist, as in not everything I paint is graffiti. Sure, most of it relates to it, but the profession as an artist differs from writing graffiti. I am also a proud member of Artists Association MUU.

Screenshot from MarkoSaarelainen.com front page, reddish edited picture of skulls and cemetary, with the website title and slogan on top of it.
Designer

I am also a graphic designer, a profession I’ve pursued for nearly 25 years. But these two identities are not separate — they are deeply connected. One cannot exist without the other.

Graffiti Coloring Books.

This is not the first time I’m representing plain outlines. I’ve done three coloring books as well as published and contributed to one before them.

Coloring Book #1

“Leiskuva Graffiti Coloring Book” (2014) was the first of it’s kind in Finland. It had outlines from the best Finnish graffiti writers. Half of the print was reserved for educational purposes. The book sold out within a few months time!

Coloring Book #2

“Who Made Who | ACTON — Style Exchange” (2022) was related to an exhibition by the same name. There was two print runs of the book, since the first sold out almost immediately it was released. The second one is pretty much sold out too.

Coloring Book #3

My personal project, “Somehow, Satan Got Behind Me” (2024), is a coloring book that presents various names of the devil in graffiti lettering. There’s almost thirty different versions. Cover art was created by artist extraordinaire KaiH.

Coloring Book #4

“Who Made Who | ACTON — Style Exchange” (2025) is continuation to the coloring book of the same name released in 2022. Totally new sketches, slightly different group of artists. Available from few selected stores in Helsinki.

Statistics.

Numbers! We all love them.

Song Title Sketches
0
Band Name Sketches
0
Related Graffities Painted
+ 0
Product Reviews Written
0

Latest Reviews.

Product reviews related to the artwork presented on this site. More info about the reviews here.

Various of views and symbols of photoediting software.

Image Editors, pt.2

As I mentioned in my previous article on software, I decided to take the plunge toward open-source solutions. But beyond the openness of the software and its platforms, one thing…

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Software, continued

Some water has flowed under the bridge since the first software review I wrote last fall. For many reasons — well, really just one, but let’s not dive into politics…

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A printer & scanner with the scanner lid open.

Printer & Scanner

Epson XP-8700 is the one I’ve been using since 2022. It’s a pretty decent device — I mainly use it for printing and editing sketches by hand, but even more…

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REVIEWED BRANDS