Contributed by Adam Simon / Carey Young’s exhibition “Appearance” at Paula Cooper is the latest installment of her more than 20-year artistic examination of the law as an institution. She is a leading progenitor of a growing cohort of artists who use research and analysis of institutions and systems in their work. In a video on the gallery website, Young states, “Law is too important to be left to lawyers… There are many ways to talk about it that haven’t been addressed.” Other reviews have focused on the information transmitted through the photos and video in the show. There remains the fundamental question of how, or if, an art exhibition can talk about a subject as prosaic as law in a constructively different way than a written or spoken medium. Does the language of visual art engage thought differently?