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Freeways. Palm trees. Searing sunsets. That is how Los Angeles is depicted in popular culture. But how might L.A. be imagined by artificial intelligence? Plug “Los Angeles” into a rendering bot, and chances are you’ll get the same aesthetic, since A.I. draws its imagery from what already exists. To avoid the tropes, we turned to literature, poetry and myth to see how Midjourney, the A.I.-powered rendering program, might visualize L.A.’s metaphorical character(s) instead of its literal landscape.
In this visual poem, we stitched together evocative texts about Los Angeles as a way of articulating our city’s bizarre beauty and uncanny oddities. Then we asked A.I. to imagine them. It’s as weird as you might imagine.
Tap the * to see more about each excerpt. Enjoy!
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The earth resting on the backs of seven giants
As referenced in a section about Tongva/Gabrielino cosmology in “The First Angelinos: The Gabrielino Indians of Los Angeles,” by William McCawley, 1996.[1]
An island called California, inhabited by Black women, their armor was made entirely out of gold
As conjured by Spanish novelist Garci Rodríguez de Montalvo in “The Labors of the Very Brave Knight Esplandían,” the 1510 novel from which California gets its name. These words are drawn from a 1992 English-language edition translated by William Thomas Little.[2]
Peacocks screaming in the olive trees and an eerie absence of surf
Drawn from Joan Didion’s description of the sinister power of the Santa Ana winds in her essay “Los Angeles Notebook,” 1965-67, as it appeared in “Slouching Towards Bethlehem,” published in 1968.[3]
A Basin that looks like coffee-stained carpetwith a few pointy rocks dropped on top
Drawn from art critic Peter Plagens’ famous rejoinder to architect Reyner Banham’s sunny views of Los Angeles in a piece of criticism first published in Artforum in December 1972, then reproduced by Art Agenda on May 6, 2012.[4]
A great circus without a tent
Historian Carey McWilliams describing Los Angeles in the roaring ‘20s in “Southern California: An Island on the Land,” originally published in 1946. This quote was taken from the 9th edition, published 2009.[5]
A shining soul with a golden body
Taken from poet Vachel Lindsay’s descriptions of L.A. in his book about cinema. “The Art of the Moving Picture” was originally published in 1915 and later excerpted in “Writing Los Angeles,” edited by David L. Ulin and published in 2002.[6]
A giant sanatorium with flowers
John Rechy describing the region in his groundbreaking and revelatory novel about the gay hustling life, “City of Night,” first published in 1963. The quote is taken from the 1994 edition published by Grove Press.[7]
The dried banks of a concrete river
This line, describing the Los Angeles River, is drawn from the namesake poem in L.A. poet laureate Luis Rodriguez’s 1990 collection “The Concrete River,” and later reproduced by poets.org.[8]
A Miesian skyscape raised to dementia
Famed essayist Mike Davis describing the downtown Los Angeles financial district and Bunker Hill in “City of Quartz,” first published in 1990. The quote featured here was drawn from the 2006 edition.[9]
Eucalyptus trees in a Carlos Almaraz city
Poet Sesshu Foster paints a beguiling word picture of Los Angeles in the poem that begins “Highland Park lies across hills …” in his collection “City Terrace Field Manual,” published in 1996.[10]
A smoggy, starless, nougat-huednight sky flamed by a million Burger King signs
Sandra Tsing Loh describes the aesthetics of Van Nuys and the San Fernando Valley in her 2001 memoir, “A Year in Van Nuys.”[11]
Gold eye of sun and gray anguished arms of avenue
Poet Wanda Coleman describing the city’s landscape in the poem “Prisoner of Los Angeles (2),” as it appears in “The Geography of Home: California’s Poetry of Place,” published in 1993.[12]