Angles, Lines, and Light

It's spring break week at Penn State. What that means for someone like me, a woman whose heart and hands appear to be ruled by her camera, is that our beautiful campus is practically deserted, a situation that provides me with some marvelous opportunities for photography!

I may have mentioned that when I have meetings on campus, I park near the Arboretum. The lot I park in is by the new Katz law school building, just off Park Avenue, not far from our famous stadium. The building is one I still consider "new," as it was completed and people began to move into it in late 2008. (You can catch a tiny glimpse of the Katz building in this photo of the Arboretum I took last summer - it's to the top right of the shot, beyond the sprinklers.)

To be honest, I've never cared much for the building from the exterior, as it's one of those modern affairs that is sort of strange looking, shaped almost like a truncated airplane hangar. And it's an odd shade of green, like weathered copper. (You can see a full exterior shot here - and the short video at the bottom right of the linked page shows, near the end, more of both the inside and the outside of this building.) But I had seen the huge exterior windows, and I suspected the building might contain something I coveted: a view overlooking the Arboretum.

And so on Wednesday, I left for my afternoon meeting on campus a little early, so I could spend 15 minutes strolling through the Katz building. What I found inside was a surprisingly beautiful, almost breathtaking space, full of angles, lines, and light.

I walked in the front doors and wandered around the main lobby area on the first floor. Then I climbed the stairwell to the second floor. Even the narrowest of hallways was appealing, with study areas featuring blue comfortable chairs just a shade darker than a robin's egg, sunny-looking, pale yellow walls, plants which may have been ivy in planters above, green leaves trailing down, and skylights above it all.

From there I did a walk-through of the law library on the second floor. There were only two or three people in the entire place. And what did I find there but rows and rows of orderly bookshelves in the main room, and a long ramp along the windows that extended up, up, up - practically into the sky! On the ramp was a long line of small but functional golden blonde desks along the windows overlooking the Arboretum. I had found what I had come looking for!

Each desk had a chair and a lamp. At the edge of each desk was a bookshelf of law books. On top of each bookshelf was inscribed an inspiring quote related to law, such as this one: "Where law ends, tyranny begins."

I turned around at the top of the ramp and looked back down into the law library to get this shot. You can see the orderly desks, chairs, lamps, bookshelves; and through the window to the left, the Arboretum grounds.

I can barely begin with just this one photo to capture the appeal of this place. All I can say is that it was gorgeous beyond my wildest expectations, very airy and full of light. It was a gray and cloudy day out when I visited; one wonders, what would this space look like on a perfect, sunny, blue-sky day?

If I were a law student, I would spend many happy hours in this building, in this particular space, soaking up its orderliness, its straight lines. Rarely have I felt so inspired by an interior space; I can't wait to go back for another photo shoot soon.

The song to accompany this photo is, in honor of the future lawyers who will be trained here, the Warren Zevon classic, Lawyers, Guns, and Money. In this particular clip, which is one of his many appearances on the David Letterman TV show, Zevon and the band preface it with a brief, 50-second interlude of Trouble. Enjoy!