My search to uncover the mystery behind the hundreds of 'heart-headed people' drawings all over the Belmont section of the Bronx led me inside a men's bathroom in the basement of a pizza shop 11 p.m. on a Tuesday night.

Simplistic and abundant, the two-dimensional figures with heart shaped heads and two upwards-arcing arms stand out from most graffiti tags in the neighborhood. Desperate to learn more about the artist responsible for brightening my day whenever I found a new drawing, I reached out to some Fordham students and some local shop owners. Although none of them could give me a name, one girl recognized the symbol from a sticker on the door of Pugsley's Pizza, a family run establishment on E 191st St., and suggested I look there.

Sal and Peter Natale, the owner of Pugsley's and his son respectively, knew exactly who I was looking for when I showed them a picture I took of one of the doodles on a Fordham Road lamp post.

Peter pulled up an Instagram account on his phone and handed it to me, "that's Sie's work," he said, "I could tell you about it, but it's better coming from him."

They took me downstairs to see the first 'heart-head's Sie, or Sienide (his tag name), drew in the restaurant. On a wall just above a urinal were three of the familiar characters, different sizes and outline colors, but with the same overall message.

In the basement of Pugsley's Pizza face to face with Sienide's first heart-headed drawings in the restaurant. Photo by Kelly Bright.

As we walked back up to the main floor, Sal began to smirk. "You'll see him eventually. He comes in here almost every night," he said, "but be careful, he's a real charmer."

Behind his shadowed identity, vast portfolio of art, and unique sense of style, Sienide is exactly that: charming. His mellowed tone and loving mindset came through clearly over the several phone calls we had before agreeing to meet at Pugsley's Sunday night.

When Sienide walked in Peter made a joke about him getting 'all dressed up to talk to a girl'. The two laughed and then spoke about their lives like brothers who hadn't talked in months. He ordered a La Rossa from one of his friends behind the counter before sitting down at a table in the far corner of the room with me. Sienide was dressed in a denim jacket and jeans held up with a black bandana in lieu of a belt. He was going to a Marc Anthony concert with his brother later that evening.

The tickets were a present from his mother, who ironically, I soon learned, played a significant role in the inspiration for his heart-headed people. If you ask him where he was born, he'll tell you, "in a bathroom". But after you pry a little deeper, you'll learn Sienide grew up in different sections of the Bronx and because both his Puerto Rican mother and his Trinidadian father worked, his dad's mother would often take care of him. His wide and warm smile never leaving his face, Sienide showed me a heart-shaped scar on the palm of his left hand and explained how one day his mother picked him up from his grandmother's house and his hand was bandaged with a bunch of toilet paper.

"My grandma says that I grabbed an Iron" he said, "my family used to tell me my grandmother did it to me on purpose, like some type of voodoo shit".

His mother was especially skeptical, but Sienide wanted her to see he still loved his family regardless. He began to doodle the heart figures with all his signatures. "I would draw them in cards for my mom" he said, "It said to her, 'I'm alright. I'm not bothered'".

One of Sienide's heart-headed people next to the scar that inspired its existence. Photographed by Emma Carey.

Sienide scribbled on a pink Pugsley's take-out menu as he talked, and when we reached the question of the heart-head's origin, he opened it up so I could watch. "I started with an 'eye', 'love', U" he said as he traced out the shape of an eye with a heart and the letter 'u' inside concentrically. Eventually, he added on the body shape and decided to replace the eye with a heart in place of the figure's head to make the 'heart-headed' image many Bronx residents and Fordham students now know and love.

Sienide drew his first heart-head as a toddler, and started painting at the age of seven. He picked up vandal, what's commonly known as 'graffiti' art in 1981 when he moved back to New York from Puerto Rico. Most of Sienide's pieces, especially spray painted ones, are impromptus and freestyles, unless he's working in a studio. "I use the outside walls as a workout. I have to stretch, pull, climb ladders" he said, "I don't want to be a slave to a reference.

Sienide draws most of the heart-headed people on the go. "I'm usually drunk or riding by on my bike," he said. "Sometimes, I'll see one and think, 'did I do that one?' 'cuz I won't remember drawing it."

A heart-headed person drawn onto a lamp post on Fordham Road outside of Fordham University in the Bronx. Kelly Bright.

Consciously, or subconsciously if he's inebriated, Sienide tries to place his symbols of love where people would only see them if they looked away from their phones. "Technology gets in the way looking at the world on a daily basis" he explained, "there's love everywhere if you take time to enjoy the atmosphere."

This positive approach to life comes from a much darker inspiration. Sienide draws a lot of his inspiration from death, hardship, and the common humble man's struggles. "I do it for the under dog, the kids in the shelter, the man that can't afford an education," he said, "that's what hits me at my core and gets me out of my bed." Sienide dropped out of school in tenth grade and turned to selling drugs to make a living. He was on the run from the cops either for his dealing or his graffiti for many years. Although he continued to practice his art on the side, it wasn't until he decided to go back to school that he rediscovered beauty life again.

Sienide attended Monroe College, got his GED, and eventually earned a Master's degree from FIT, the Fashion Institute of Technology. "I always knew the art side, but I didn't understand the business side" he said, " "School taught me my worth". His education introduced him to another passion in his life: teaching.

"Before I even knew what teaching was I knew what teaching was" Sienide said. Since 1992, he's been leading workshops, organizing programs, and teaching classes with a focus on enlightening city youth on ways to implement art as a vehicle for positive change and expression. He once orchestrated a public program in the Bronx where he and a group of artists connected with a department of probation office to help kids in trouble for vandalism put their art in galleries for commission. Today, he is a professor at Bloomfield College in New Jersey, where he teaches a graffiti and contemporary art class, the first ever class of its kind in a college setting. He noted his teaching philosophy is more focused on "intuition than tuition", with a higher emphasis on connecting with students at a deeper and more intimate level than more grade-oriented professors.

Sienide's heart is as pure and open as the ones in his drawings which led me to him originally. He believes in the unity of humanity and the separating of differences from our interactions with one another. "No face, no color, no race, no religion, no politics," he said, "you and I are just a heart-headed people." He told me he doesn't like the news or arguing about things like sports or religion because of their divisive nature. "We should leave that aside when we speak so we can get along better" he said, "we could be talking about something else like your family".

Sienide's current project is preparing for a collaborative art show in February 2019 with another popular graffiti artist, Al "SAMO©" Diaz. Diaz used to share the tag 'SAMO©" with Jean-Michel Basquiat, an African-American artist who went from living off the streets to one of the most successful and popular painters in history. Basquiat overdosed at the young age of 27 after the criticism and pressure of living in the spotlight, but the legend of his life and his work lives on today. Sienide considers him a huge inspiration, as well as Al Diaz, who struggled with depression and addiction before turning his life around for the better through the power of art.

Their project will examine and commentate on American society using a visual art medium to make snarky and political remarks. "It's gonna be shit that people won't say or converse about but would like to say and converse about" Sienide said, "It's important for us to voice our opinions for those who don't".

The drawing of the body with crescent-shaped arms and a heart as a head on the men's bathroom wall in Pugsley's pizza doesn't need commentary or voiced opinions. It's open arms, open heart, and open mind tell the viewer, 'Look! I'm here, I need love and I have love to give' without any words or auxiliary details. They serve as an escape from the complexities and tribulations of the 'society' we live in today. "It's simple," Sienide said drawing a heart-head on the back of my phone case, "and that's how life should be".

A heart-headed doodle outside of Fordham's Arthur Ave off-campus apartments. Kelly Bright.