Spiral Town / AI Spiral Art

Submission 12,632

Part of a series on AI Art. [View Related Entries]

Check out our explainer What Is Spiral Town And Was It Made By Man Or Machine-

About

Spiral Town, also known as AI Spiral Art, refers to discussions and debates about an AI-generated artwork created by X user @MrUgleh with the help of Stable Diffusion. The painting depicts an optical illusion in which the shadows and shapes of several buildings evoke the appearance of a spiral. The image was first posted to the /r/stablediffusion subreddit before being shared to X in mid-September 2023 where people expressed surprise at the image being made by AI.

Origin

On September 10th, 2023, Redditor^[1] /r/Ugleh posted an image titled, "Spiral Town – different approach to qr monster," to /r/stablediffusion. The image gathered over 3,000 upvotes in five days (seen below).

On September 11th, X^[2] user @deepfates reposted the image with the caption, "unnh." The post gathered over 67,000 likes in four days (seen below).

Spread

X user @deepfates's repost of the image on September 11th, 2023, gathered varied reactions from people who were surprised and some who were disappointed by learning that the image was AI-generated, as seen in the replies to the post (seen below).

This sentiment was also reflected in some quotes of the post, with one post made by X^[3] user @ZakugaMignon on September 12th, 2023, gathering over 36,000 likes in three days (seen below, left) and another post^[4] by @99_monochrome that read, "Going through the 7 stages of grief after learning this was ai 💀" gathering over 23,000 likes in a similar timeframe (seen below, right).

Not all reactions to the post were negative, with X^[5] user @paulg posting the image on September 11th with the caption, "This was the point where AI-generated art passed the Turing Test for me," gathering over 20,000 likes in four days (seen below, left).

X^[6] user @shambibble commented on the general pushback against the image saying, "everyone replying 'I thought this was cool but its AI' is conceding the only ultimate criterion for evaluating art. it's like gritting your teeth and refusing to enjoy amateur song remixes or fan-fiction. elevating our weird/arbitrary IP laws to an entire joyless ethos," gathering over 1,000 likes in three days (seen below, right).

On September 11th, X^[7] user @natetella reposted the image saying, "I painted this." The post gathered over 40,000 likes in four days (seen below).

On September 14th, X^[8] user @MrUgleh, the creator of the image in question, replied to @deepfates's post sharing similar images made by him on the same day (seen below).