“It's like paradise with a lobotomy.” — Neil Simon, regarding Los Angeles

(un)real landscapes: Los Angeles plays itself 

Like the rest of the globe, on March 19, 2020, the Coronavirus forced Angelenos to quarantine and shelter in place. (un)real landscapes: Los Angeles plays itself explores what a pandemic society looks like — otherworldly, unreal.

Pre-pandemic, the streets of Los Angeles were decidedly at odds. Increasing homelessness, changing demographics, and rapid gentrification of older neighborhoods were already happening. Parallel with this, Los Angeles is the movie backlot of the world — a pretend land, a place for dreamers. Los Angeles is all of this and more. During this unfabled time, the city revealed a subverted self and an ever-changing sense of place.

Shot using a color-enhanced infrared (IR) (665nm) camera, (un)real landscapes' IR images call to mind Kodak's Aerochrome infrared film. This film was used frequently by governments, the military, and the scientific community for aerial photographic applications, such as vegetation and forestry surveys, hydrology, and earth resources monitoring, where infrared adds a different dimension of discrimination. In (un)real landscapes, the infrared camera also transforms our understanding of urban topography and shows nature’s persistence, often shrouded in surreality.