This blog post was written by public art consultant Patricia Walsh, and is a version of an article originally published in Public Art Curious. Read the full article.
Is a mural a work of art, or is it a sign? Most people assume the answer is obvious. It isn’t. And in communities across the country, that ambiguity is creating legal and administrative problems — costing cities hundreds of thousands of dollars, chilling artistic expression and leaving property owners, artists and municipal staff without clear guidance.
The Legal Tension
A central issue is the distinction between commercial speech and non-commercial speech. Commercial speech relates to the economic interests of the speaker; non-commercial speech encompasses ideas, artistic expression and visual art conveyed without a direct commercial purpose. From a public art perspective: is the image doing something (function), or saying something (form)?
That distinction sounds simple until you look at real cases. In Wag More Dogs, LLC v. Cozart (PDF), a dog daycare in Arlington, Va., commissioned a mural of cartoon dogs and paw prints, intending it as neighborhood beautification. The county classified it as a sign. The court agreed — because some of the cartoon dogs incorporated in the logo of the business. One design detail shifted the mural from protected artistic expression into regulable commercial speech.
When policy doesn’t answer this question clearly, courts do. In Salina, Kan., a restaurant owner hired an artist to paint a whimsical mural of flying-saucer hamburgers on his building. The city halted the work, calling it a sign. The restaurant sued and won — and the city appealed. The case is now before the 10th Circuit with a potential path to the Supreme Court. Salina has already spent over $800,000 in legal fees. The city had a sign code but no mural program, and that gap is now a case of potential national significance.
Why This Is So Hard to Resolve
Several factors compound the challenge. Determinations often rely on intent or narrative rather than objective criteria, putting the burden of argument on the artist or property owner. This isn’t purely an arts issue — it sits at the intersection of zoning law, planning and First Amendment jurisprudence, implicating multiple departments and legal teams. And there is no standard across the country: according to the National Zoning Atlas, there are over 30,000 zoning jurisdictions nationwide with every community largely working this out on its own.
Policies Worth Studying
A few communities have developed approaches worth examining:
- Los Angeles, Calif. — After outdoor advertising companies sued the city in 2002, arguing that restricting commercial signs while allowing murals was discriminatory, Los Angeles banned both. The moratorium held for over a decade. In 2013, the city developed a mural ordinance that lifted the ban, clearly differentiated murals from advertisements and created a registration process with community participation. The cautionary tale is instructive: when a city can’t distinguish between art and signs, it becomes legally vulnerable.
- Goose Creek, S.C. — This smaller community’s ordinance allows commercial advertising murals only on the site where the business is located — regulating based on location rather than content. This is precisely the approach legal experts recommend to reduce First Amendment exposure. Administration runs through planning and zoning with approvals from the Cultural Commission — a useful cross-departmental model.
- Newport, Ky. — Newport’s mural ordinance includes 18 placement restrictions, administered through the Planning and Development Department, and the ordinance was approved through the Historic Preservation Commission. It’s a reminder that in many communities, the art-versus-sign question is only one of several regulatory frameworks a mural must navigate.
Is Your Community at Risk?
The Salina case is a live warning. Any community with murals but no mural ordinance is one commissioned artwork away from the same situation, and the same legal bills. A sign code alone isn’t enough if it doesn’t clearly address how murals are defined and regulated.
A few diagnostic questions worth bringing back to your own community:
- Does your sign code define murals, or are they simply absent from the language?
- Which department or departments handle mural permits? If there are multiple departments involved, do they all have a shared decision-making process?
- Do you have a registration or review process that gives property owners and artists clear expectations upfront?
If the answers are unclear, that ambiguity won’t stay abstract. The good news is that communities don’t have to start from scratch as the policy examples above offer real models to build from, and getting ahead of the question is far easier than resolving it in court.
How Can Art Help You Rethink Public Transit?
When most people think of public art in transportation, they picture a mural under a highway overpass. Something nice to look at, but ultimately decorative. Across the country, though, cities are proving that public art in and around transportation spaces can do far more than beautify. It can make streets safer, sustain local economies and change how communities participate in planning.
Put Your City’s Public Art on the Map with the Public Art Archive
- CitiesSpeak Guest
Designing Climate-Resilient Outdoor Spaces with Nature-Based Solutions
- Vera Feeny
Creativity and Collaboration for Healthier Cities
How Public Art Helps Cities Rethink Transportation
- Georgia Gempler
Creative Cites: A Conversation with Providence, RI Mayor Brett Smiley
- Georgia Gempler
