MLK Exhibit Opens In Harlem On Civil Rights Hero's 90th Birthday

HARLEM, NY — A new exhibit featuring rarely-seen photographs of Martin Luther King Lr., is opening in Harlem on the civil rights icon's 90th birthday, the New York Public Library announced Tuesday.

The exhibit — called "Crusader: Martin Luther King Jr." — will run at the NYPL's Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture from Jan. 15 to April 6, library officials announced. Photographs from King's 1953 pilgrimage to India, his 1964 acceptance of the Nobel Peace Prize in Norway and more travels will take center-stage at the exhibit.

"Most of the popular photography we see of Dr. King, positions him as preacher and icon in the Civil Rights Movement, as he certainly was..." Kevin Young, director of the Schomburg Center, said in a statement.

"In this exhibition, we see King beyond constraints of the American narratives within which he has been so often placed. It was from outside of these boundaries that he would solidify the philosophy that transformed him and that he would use to transform America and the world."

The photos also feature King's frequent travel companions such as his wife Corretta Scott King, fellow civil rights activists Ralph Abernathy and Dorothy Cotton and King's biographer Lawrence Dunbar Reddick. Reddick served as the Schomburg Center's second curator following the death of Arturo Schomburg.

"When we think about our heroes and icons, we sometimes forget or take for granted that they too are human, with hopes, curiosities, personal affections, and concerns. King is so often credited with and revered for influencing us, but Crusader offers us the chance to reflect on the people, ideas, and experiences that influenced him," Novella Ford, associate director of public programs and exhibitions at the Schomburg Center, said in a statement.

Images featured in the exhibit were taken by renowned photographers such as Moneta Sleet, Jr., Austin Hansen, Robert Sengstacke, and Ben Fernandez, library officials said. The exhibits launch coincides with King's 90th birthday and the 60th anniversary of the republication of Reddick's biography of King "Crusader Without Violence."

The exhibit will be displayed in the Schomburg Center’s Latimer/Edison Gallery through April 6.

Photo by J. Wilds/Hulton Archive/Getty Images