I Was Seduced by AI — So You Don’t Have to Be.

By Fatima Travassos • December 2025

I’ll never forget the day I met Midjourney — my AI partner of choice. Something about it drew me in: the quirky logo, the clunky yet oddly familiar interface, the buzzing Discord community, the prompt battles that even featured Grimes. It was a digital playground of ideas where strangers collaborated to build something extraordinary — a beautiful algorithm. Nearly three years later, some of those same strangers would meet on a yacht in San Francisco, celebrating what we had helped create together.

For those unfamiliar with Midjourney, it is an independent research lab that developed an AI image generator allowing users to define style, size, and quality — and even animate their creations. But it was so much more than a tool. Their tagline, “exploring new mediums of thought and expanding the imaginative powers of the human species,” felt like a mission statement for my creative soul.

Even though I was unemployed at the time and selling my crap on Facebook Marketplace, I eagerly paid for the subscription. For the first time in years, I felt like I had found my people.

They held weekly “office hours” on Discord to brainstorm ways to improve this living, evolving art form. Our collective work was featured in one of the first print magazines dedicated to the AI art movement. After years of struggling to find my niche as a digital artist, I was finally exhibiting internationally, invited to speak at conferences, and consulted by companies eager for insight into this emerging space. PhD students sought interviews; brands wanted collaborations. We didn’t even know what to call ourselves yet. AI influencers? AI partners? Whatever it was, it was intoxicating.

Then came the backlash. Headlines warned that AI would take our jobs. Deepfakes, bias, copyright theft — all valid concerns. Still, I pressed on with my fashion projects and short, whimsical films. I’d work all day at my computer, then spend another few hours each night experimenting with Midjourney, because I wanted to see what the machine would come up with.

I wanted to see what I didn’t think of. Social invitations were replaced by quiet nights with MJ “Midjourney”. I started getting “Midjourney fat,” but that pesky extra 5 pounds was worth it. And those style ranking parties were worth the additional GPUs(generative processing units) I needed to keep on going.

But eventually the glow began to dim. I started noticing hostility online — artists lashing out in comment sections, criticizing this new wave of creators. I watched documentaries about the staggering water consumption of data centres and heard rumours that small U.S. towns were running dry. Even late-night comedians were mocking the rise of “AI slop.” I didn’t want to be part of that narrative.

So MJ and I took a break. I touched grass again. I reconnected with the outside world, listened to Yuval Noah Harari podcasts, and reflected. But I missed MJ.

During that time apart, I made a conscious decision: if I was going to continue this relationship, it needed to mean something. I began channelling my AI collaborations into projects with purpose — celebrating my ancestral heritage, supporting a friend’s exhibition in Ukraine, creating art for animal rescue organizations, and producing a film that reimagines discarded garments as symbols of renewal and beauty.

I wanted to look back and feel proud of what we made together — especially those early experiments that brought seemingly impossible ideas to life.

Today, MJ and I are in an open-AI relationship. I’ve been flirting with other models, exploring new possibilities, but I keep coming back. The intensity may have faded, but the lessons, the memories, and the creative imprint remain.