Ruscha in LA

I'm just finishing reading Ed Ruscha's Los Angeles by Alexandra Schwartz (MIT Press, 2010). Schwartz edited an earlier book of Ruscha's writing, Leave Any Information at the Signal (also by MIT Press, 2002) and her new book is the closest thing to a biography of the artist yet published. Using accessible language and a generally compelling story-line, Schwartz's well-researched book does well in examining the artist's role in four areas of culture: Pop Art, film, architecture, and, what I think can best be called, machismo. All are framed within their relationship to Los Angeles as well, though it's not clear to me that the book couldn't have also been titled Los Angeles' Ed Ruscha. Did he shape LA, or did LA shape him? Perhaps, in the end, the reason the man and the city are so entwined in the popular imagination, and the reason Schwart'z clever framework comes off as merely scratching the surface of inquiry into the connections, is that they inform one another equally. A perfect marriage of art and place. And in this book and the one previous, maybe also of artist and art historian.