The Visual and the Law of Cities

This article will attempt to explore, through four separate “tableaux,” or brief sketches, four ways in which the visual interplays with the law of cities, and how a deeper understanding of this intersection can assist in the development of these laws and their underlying policies. This discussion will by no means be definitive. However, by presenting these four approaches in which the visual complicates and assists the law of cities, and sometimes even acts as the law of cities, it is hoped the article will spur a dialogue on the law’s relationship to the visual.