Law School

The following is perhaps the best justification for my interest in law I have yet written:


I have my usual obsessions with history and our modern perception of it, especially with early modern life and thought (1450-1789). I was always very interested in how the eighteenth century particularly seemed to me to reflect at times a much more fluid approach to life, government, and morality than that of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. It seems strange to me then that we are at the same time so much more distant in terms of sympathy and understanding with people and ideas from that time. This was some of the focus of my history thesis where I sought to explore the ideology of the French military nobility on the eve of the Revolution. I tried to show how their image of a specialized column of society dedicated to defense seemed to them perfectly consistent with modern rational thought, because even if that specialization were dictated by birth it was still better than having no specialization whatsoever.

In my art during college, I either tried to address my goals above or went towards evoking my personal relationship with history and tradition. One project of mine was a triptych made of drawing and collage of contemporaneous images, some from my research in Paris, that evoked the literal interior/mental interior/ideological space of three different characters: a military nobleman in front of his mantle surrounded by military images and the Sun King, a noblewoman in her private chapel reading an 18th century pornographic novel and surrounded by the actual image plates from that book, and a peasant hunter in a stone room (kitchen or prison) surrounded by cruel scenes, weapons, and hides. In a more personal way and more relating to art history, one project of mine was a Vanitas-style still life of modern forms of media, all of which I own: records, books, VHS tapes, CD's, etc. I tried to use the symbols and meaning of tradition towards my own purposes.

In that latter effort, I wanted to address media theory in general, though it was only my beginnings in the area. I meant to highlight their obsolescence. Through your guidance, I discovered Kittler and some other ideas about media theory. I now have a lot of opinions on the subject, mostly about how the visual is still dominant, but has a long way to go to reach its potential in terms of omnipresence and its power to be a democratic and populist form of communication now that it is accessible to YouTubers or serious graphic novelists with an actual serious audience (which Youtube lacks, for now).

Currently, I am working on some graphic novel stories: one relating to Durkheim entitled Duckheim and another on daydreaming about time travel. I am also painting a little and may have started a novel. Mostly, though, I am reading a lot and filling in the holes in my Chicago education, i.e. Durkheim.

While considering my likely next stop in life, the law, I had an idea for an art concept. I could take note as I learn the law of certain loopholes relating to allowing for any artistic expression. I could then fill those holes literally with my own work or even others' (a sort of public curator at law). In that way I can fill in the "negative space" of the law and reveal how omnipresent it is, but also expose it's real limits. By pointing out those limits, I can bring attention to them and get others to push the boundaries as well, both metaphorically and literally. Most important of all perhaps is my desire to de-legislate and free up the law so that it makes intuitive sense in its jurisdiction and leaves room for public discourse and approval/disapproval of actions and ideas without recourse to legality.

My mention of the democratizing potentialities of visual media may have clued towards this, but my real obsession is with the creation of a legitimate and powerful public sphere that can exist between what you could call the government and the masses. Like Habermas, I don't believe that the government represents society nor wholly acts in its interest. Therefore, I want to limit the power of government and allow for society to create more fluid institutions that could in turn breed generations of responsible individuals rather than the opposed masses we have had for quite some time. To further this would be my dream. And somehow my interests in the law and art/creativity/expression seem to complement that goal. I guess I have lofty ideas still and therefore can perhaps be confident that I haven't succumbed to despair or careerism, though I am applying to law school.