Katsu, like many graffiti artists, has a preoccupation with leaving his mark in hard-to-reach places. A few years back he developed an especially clever tool for the job, modifying a fire extinguisher to spray larger-than-life tags across entire walls. (One high-profile target: the side of the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles in 2012, just as it was opening a hugely publicized exhibition of graffiti art. The wall was promptly buffed clean.)

 

The artist’s latest innovation has the potential to extend his reach even further. It’s a spray-paint-wielding drone.

 

Katsu, who gained graffiti fame in the 1990s in New York City, showed a series of paintings created by the flying machine at the Silicon Valley Contemporary art fair last weekend. The splotchy canvasses wouldn’t necessary stop you in your tracks, but the process by which they were created is entirely new. Katsu pilots the craft remotely, but every movement is translated through the machine’s need to keep itself aloft.