Hit the Books While Basking in Beautiful Art At the 5th Avenue NYPL

In the midst of a hectic neighborhood made up of H&M, Pret-a-Manger, and corporate offices, stands the Humanities and Social Sciences Library, a serene haven for readers and perusers alike located on 42nd Street and Fifth Avenue.

The library is worth a visit, not only because it is a beautiful place to work, but also because the journey to Fifth Avenue affords a helpful change of scenery. For students in need of a break from Morningside Heights, this is just the place to spur your brain out of stagnation. And, because it’s an excellent space for studying, a trip to the Public Library makes for a guilt-free city excursion.

Past the library’s cavernous entrance hall, the stairs lead to the Rose Main reading room. One of the best things about this library is that much of the art it contains is integrated into the building itself—murals and statues are everywhere. Stretching over the rows of reading tables are enormous windows through which readers have been watching the skyline change for nearly a hundred years. If you should happen to take a mental break and stare into space, you can rest assured that you’ll end up staring at something beautiful.

The library provides great opportunities for study breaks as well. Two exhibit halls flank the Rose Main reading room. To the right of the room is “William James Bennett: Master of the Aquatint View,” a series of topographical prints created during the 1830s and 1840s of a variety of urban centers. The NYPL’s magazine Now says of the prints: “Capturing the optimism of the new country, his [James Bennett’s] magnificent works are regarded as the finest folio views of 19th century American cities.”

To the left is Stephen Dupont’s extraordinary “Afghanistan, or The Perils of Freedom.” Dupont is a highly acclaimed photographer, documentary filmmaker, and war correspondent, and this is his first solo exhibition in the United States. A perfect example of art inciting change, Dupont’s coverage of the war in Afghanistan resulted in required cultural-awareness training for U.S. troops stationed there.

Dupont’s photographs of the war, and of Afghanistan’s burgeoning drug industry, are startling, even in black and white. One depicts a young man with an indescribable expression holding a rifle in his prosthetic arms, and another captures a bicycling man who seems to be more shadow than human being. These images are juxtaposed with a horrifying, dehumanizing portrayal of the effect of war: the back of a marine’s helmet, upon which is written, in stark capitals, “’03 KILL EM ALL.”

On the other wall is a series of Dupont’s portraits of Afghanis entitled “Axe me Biggie.” This phrase is, as Now informs us, “a phonetic rendering of the Dari for ‘Mister, take my picture!’” In the first set of photographs there is a decided lack of humanity—people seem mere objects in the landscape of war.
The subjects of the portraits, however, fiercely assert their right to be human, even when faced with war’s atrocities. Men with abrasive self-confidence pose clutching money or guns, a woman warily holds up the eggs she is selling, and a man with an incongruous bouquet of flowers all regard the camera with expressions that are part animosity, part incredulousness.

A visit to the Fifth Avenue library is part field trip, part pilgrimage, part mental awakening, as well as a chance to get work done outside of Morningside Heights. And for students who aren’t afraid to multi-task, this is a pretty perfect arrangement.

The New York Public Library of Humanities and Social Sciences is located at 42nd Street and Fifth Avenue. It is open Monday through Saturday from 11 a.m. - 6 p.m., and Sunday from 1-5 p.m.