Introduction

Sick city. Quarantine city. Hostile city. Anxious city. Fearful city. Unsafe city. Restrictive city. Dystopian city. Lockdown city. Timeless city. Closed city. Empty city. Isolated city. Distanced city. Divorced city. Pod city. Lonely city. Homeless city. Unequal city. Divided city. Sourdough city. No toilet paper city. Quiet city. Birds are back city. Nature takes over city. Opera on the balcony city. Clapping in the streets city. Work from home city. Zoom city. Frontline city. Essential workers city. Home-schooled city. Unemployed city. Business as usual city. Masked city. Gloved city. Disinfectant city. Plexiglas and tape city. Bored city. Impatient city. Crowded city. Protest city. Compliant city. Defiant city. Selfish city. Selfless city. New normal city.

Multiple and mutable images of the city have emerged during the COVID-19 pandemic. There is the conceptual image of the city formed in our imaginations: a newly hostile and restrictive space that influences our affective experiences, emotions, mental health, and behavior. There is the perceptual image of the city that has aesthetically and materially changed: redesigned and reconfigured, marked with new materials and by novel forms of litter. These conceptual and perceptual images are in turn forged through the new images in and of the city that we encounter and create. There are the images in the city: signs that instruct us how to act, messages hung in windows, and diverse forms of graffiti and street art. There are the images of the city: photographs that document these changing forms, atmospheres, and aesthetics of space. This chapter examines the relationship between image and city during the COVID-19 pandemic and reflects on these mercurial images: images in flux that reflect and communicate different aspects and stages of the pandemic. Referring to photographs taken in Oslo, Norway between March and October 2020, this chapter asks: How does the COVID-19 city look? What is the image of the COVID-19 city? How do these images and pandemic aesthetics impact our urban imaginations?

Image and city

The image of the city can be understood in different ways. Image may refer to the visual matter that makes up the city, from symbols and signs to structures and design. Images can also refer to an impression that one has of place: abstract, imagined, affective, aesthetic, intuited. When considering the relationship between image and city, Kevin Lynch's pivotal book