Taking the Pulse of the City With Graffiti Artist EKG

Though New Yorkers are currently chasing down the next piece of Banksy street art, graffiti typically blends into the background. If you’re not a tagger, you most likely are not paying attention to the coded messages embedded in the endless stream of stylized names, faces, animals, and jokes that are constantly thrown up then torn down, sometimes in the very same day.

One street artist, however, has recently caught the attention of gallery curators and bloggers. His unique emblem: a short, bright orange electrocardiogram pulse running across walls, trucks, and mailboxes throughout the five boroughs, and on to other cities around the world.

EKG, as he is known, has had two gallery shows in the past six months. The latest, at Pandemic gallery in Brooklyn, featured a huge opening party and a large array of his distinctive scientific scrawl.

Because graffiti is illegal, EKG remains anonymous. In the following, he explains through email exchanges, what is behind