Unlike the bold, colorful hand-lettered signs he makes for restaurants, bars and other businesses, Damon Styer, the owner of New Bohemia Signs, is an understated guy.

A 1993 graduate of San Francisco Art Institute who began sign painting “on a whim” after a failed marriage and a stint at the San Francisco stock exchange, Styer emphasizes old-school values — sure-handedness and practice — and plays down the business’s artistic side.

But low key or not, Steyer’s creative cache is definitely on the rise. Five young painters, many of whom flash tattoos and share Styer’s art school training, churn out hand-painted signs and gold-leaf work for clients as diverse as North Beach’s Stinking Rose restaurant and Facebook. And last year, New Bohemia began participating in gallery exhibitions.

“I think, nationally, there’s more of an interest in DIY, maybe partly due to the economic situation,” Styer said. “People are coming to us saying, ‘We want something authentic.’”

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The company’s latest art show opened last week at Guerrero Gallery in the Mission district. Titled “Sign Your Life Away,” it was an opportunity for New Bohemia workers to apply their professional technique to pieces not done for clients. New Bohemia donated paint but does not profit from the work that is sold.

Just like the studio itself, the crowded salon-style hanging at the gallery creates a visual cacophony. Shouting smart-alecky phrases like carnival barkers on a boardwalk (“What’s the sign you’ve been waiting for?” and “You’ve been warned”), the multitude of signs makes an overwhelming yet moving paean to the form.

The show also features Jeff Canham, a Bay Area artist who used to work at New Bohemia, and Steven Powers, a high-profile graffiti artist whose colorful text-based work has been influenced from his time working with traditional sign painters.

Like silk-screening and letterpress operations, sign painting is benefiting from a general resurgence of interest in hand-done crafts.

A documentary about sign painters is to be released in early 2012, and new businesses, like Golden West Sign Arts in Berkeley and Best Dressed Signs in Boston, started by Josh Luke, a New Bohemia alumnus, are hanging up shingles.

Styer said business at New Bohemia had been brisk. Earlier this year, the company moved into a space “at least” double the size of its former studio.

Andres Guerrero, proprietor of Guerrero Gallery, used the word “authentic” in describing the exhibition’s appeal — noting as well that fans of sign painting run the gamut from graffiti enthusiasts to typography nerds.