VIDEO: JAY Z got his lyrics on the Brooklyn Public Library following Book Of Hov

JAY Z got his lyrics on the Brooklyn Public Library following Book Of Hov

Jay-Z arrives Brooklyn Public Library, second time in a row  

Remarkably, the entire project was kept a secret from Jay and his wife Beyoncé until the day before it opened, although Beyoncé’s ongoing “Renaissance” tour was probably a useful distraction.

Billed as an homage to Jay’s influence on culture, music, business and social justice, it’s a sprawling history of his life and career that extends into two floors of the museum, containing recordings, clothing, artifacts from his career, audio tours, tons of video and most of all, a living testament to his remarkable accomplishments over the past three and a half decades. Best of all? It’s free for anyone with a library card — the library has created 13 different ones, reflecting the artwork of each of his albums — and for those unable to visit, the entire exhibit is available on at thebookofhov.com, with detailed information and photos of each item.

On The Book of Hov’s website, you can find audio clips, text, and photos of the exhibition, which populates a significant portion of the 352,000-square-foot building. Library staff encouraged those visiting the exhibit to bring their own phones and headphones to augment the experience.

Several displays sit in the library’s lobby, including a multimedia “tower of power” and the full sculpture that appears on the cover of 2009’s The Blueprint 3. The New and Noteworthy room has been temporarily revamped as a home for Jay-Z’s awards and recording ephemera, along with an interactive vinyl listening station that includes a bin of records that he sampled across his own 13 albums.

According to representatives from the library, Roc Nation covered the full expense and most of the labor for the exhibit’s installation, and there will be no cost to the Brooklyn Public Library or taxpayers for the exhibit. The company is also donating an undisclosed sum of the money to the library, along with copies of books and vinyl records. Representatives indicated that Roc Nation organized The Book of Hov as a surprise to Jay-Z, and that it was arranged for the much bigger main branch instead of the smaller Marcy Library that’s closer to Jay-Z’s home neighborhood. There’s more as yet unannounced programming coming to the Marcy branch library in connection with The Book of Hov in coming months.

Rather than taking a chronological approach, the exhibit is divided into seven “zones,” based on lyrics or phrases from Jay’s songs like “Hov Did That,” “So Fly,” “A Work of Art Already,” and more (they’re described below). The exterior of the building is part of the exhibit as well, with its entire, historic front façade covered with a giant adhesive billboard bearing quotes from Jay, as well as a large video cube in front of the building, reminiscent of (but smaller than) the one in the center of the stage on Beyonce’s 2016 “Lemonade” tour.