< JEAN-SIMÉON CHARDIN. Still Life with Fish, Vegetables, Gougères, Pots, and Cruets on a Table, 1769. Oil on canvas. (JPGM)

Th rough the Getty's collections and special exhibitions,we provide immediate,

meaningful encounters between people and ori ginal works of art .Each object

we acquire, each exhibition we pre s e n t , and each event we schedule enriches our

v i s i t o rs' experi e n c e, i n c reasing their understanding and appreciation of our cultural

h e ritage and the passion, v i s i o n , and achievements of artists through the ages.T h e re

is always something to discover and enjoy.

MUSEUM COLLECTIONS & EXHIBITIONS

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A C Q U I S I T I O N S

The J. Paul Getty Museum’s commitment to collecting is based on thebelief that direct experience of an artwork is fundamental to under-standing an object’s social and historical context,m e a n i n g s , and va l u e s .

D u ring this re p o rt peri o d , the Getty’s holdings grew with the acquisition anddonation of over 1,000 works of art that have enhanced the collections anddeepened the visitor experi e n c e.The Getty Research Institute also collects bu twith a scholarly audience in mind.The holdings of the Research Library,w h i c hinclude pri m a ry source material such as art i s t s ’ s ke t c h b o o k s , d o c u m e n t s , a n dl e t t e rs , a re discussed on page 36.

Sculpture and Decorative Arts

One of the most exciting Museum acquisitions was the addition of over 50pieces of rare and beautiful stained glass spanning the 13th to the 16th cen-t u ry.The panels joined the collections of the newly merged departments ofd e c o r a t ive arts and sculpture and works of art , heralding a new direction forthe Getty.The acquisition makes the Getty one of the largest re p o s i t o ries ofstained glass in the country,with large works created for Gothic churches andc l o i s t e rs , as well as lively heraldic panels made for houses, t own halls, a n dother secular settings.The decision to add this brilliant form of “painting onl i g h t ” to the Museum’s collection was made through re s e a rch jointly conduct-e d by the curators of paintings, d r aw i n g s , and manu s c ri p t s .This confirm e dthe important relationship of the art form to the Getty’s strong holdings inm e d i eval and Renaissance manu s c ripts and paintings, as well as drawings forstained glass designs.

Another key acquisition was the Virgin and Child (ca. 1520–25), one ofthe few surv iving terracotta works from the great Renaissance sculptorAndrea Briosco, called Riccio. Originally a full-length statue, only theupper half survives.Yet the serene piece—the gentle human yet heavenlymother cradling the Christ Child in the pro t e c t ive bend of her arm —remains monumental.

Two delicate life-sized animal figures from the famed Meissen porc e l a i nm a nu fa c t o ry we re also added to the collection—Model of a Tu r k e y ( c a . 1 7 3 3 )by Johann Joachim Kändler and Model of a Fox with a Chick e n (1732) by Jo h a n nGottlieb Kirchner. The two pieces were made for Augustus the Strong’sJapanese Palace in Dre s d e n , which held 32 rooms of the ru l e r ’s collection ofChinese and Japanese porc e l a i n . Until then, no one had attempted to makesuch large porcelain objects, and new methods in firing and glazing had tobe developed to produce these life-like figure s .

Drawings

The Getty acquired its first work by Paul Gauguin, the life-sized Head of aTahitian Wo m a n ( c a .1 8 9 2 ) , for the drawings collection.The piece is an impor-tant addition because it is a defining work in Gauguin’s oeuvre.Made duri n ghis first trip to Ta h i t i , the drawing reflects a time of tremendous artistic syn-ergy between the aesthetic forms of his new surroundings and Euro p e a nt r a d i t i o n .A l t e rnately using bold and light charcoal stro ke s ,Gauguin gives hisn a t ive subject a mask-like stare and puts her in a We s t e rn dress in contrast toher Polynesian feature s , t h e re by presenting her as both a defiant teenager anda challenging personification of colonial French Ta h i t i .

RICCIO (Andrea Briosco). Virgin and Child,ca. 1520–25. Terracotta with traces ofpolychromy. (JPGM)

> OPPOSITE PAGE. EDGAR DEGAS. The Convalescent,ca. 1872–87. Oil on canvas. (JPGM)

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Manuscripts

Added to the Getty’s strong collection of illuminated manu s c ri p t s were EneasSilvius Piccolomini’s letter to Johann von Eich and his Historia de duobusamantibus (The Story of Two Lovers) (ca. 1460–70).The two texts, written bythe famed humanist Piccolomini, a re rare examples of French secular wo r k sfrom the period and are the only known texts by the author to cont a i nm i n i a t u re s .The illuminations, by an unknown art i s t , stand out by virt u e oftheir superb coloring, refined technique, and profound sense of psychol og-ical depth, demonstrating the influence of Bart h é l e my d’Eyck, one of thegreatest painters of 15th-century France.

Paintings

The paintings collection, one of the most popular in the Museum’s holdings,has been identified as having the highest priority for continued expansion.Among the important works acquired during this period was Still Life withF i s h ,Ve g e t a bl e s, G o u g è r e s, P o t s, and Cruets on a Ta ble ( 1 7 6 9 ) by the great 18th-century French artist Jean-Siméon Chardin, a celebrated master of still-lifep a i n t i n g s .The work displays a lush composition of bounty, with two hangi n gm a c ke rel in the top half of the canvas serving as a strong ve rtical counterp o i n tto the spread of food beneath them. C reated at the height of Chard i n ’s pow-e rs , the commanding work is a major addition to the Museum’s collection ofstill lifes and ranks among the most significant 18th-century paintings in anA m e rican collection.Still Life is also notewo rt hy as it is thought to be Chard i n ’sfinal signed and dated still-life wo r k .

Another important acquisition was the large-scale A Wooded Landscapewith Tra velers on a Path through a Hamlet ( c a . 1 6 6 5 ), a brilliant work re p re s e n t-ing the apex of achievement of Meindert Hobbema, one of the gre a t e s tDutch landscape artists of the 17th-century.A close look at this lively com-position reveals two paths—one bathed in sunlight on the left, and onee l evated and in shadow on the right—occupied by a wide assortment of fig-u re s .The addition of this piece has powerfully enhanced the significance ofthe Getty’s holdings of Dutch landscapes, a l ready one of the strongest gro u p sin the paintings collection.

The Conva l e s c e n t ( c a . 1 8 7 2 – Ja nu a ry 1887), an exceptional example ofEdgar Degas’ a c h i evement as a port r a i t i s t , joined the Museum’s collection,o f f e ring a different insight into an artist better known for his images of bal-let dancers and bathers . U n l i ke traditional 19th-century port r a i t s , w h i c hwe re commissioned and taken away by their ow n e rs upon completion, t h i sdepiction of an unidentified woman remained in Degas’ studio for at least15 years.The unconventional painting is also more psychologically sugges-tive and spatially ambiguous than typical portraits of the time.

Photographs

The Museum’s growing collection of photographs expanded with the acqui-sition of 28 images by the great modernist photographer Eugène A t g e t ,w i t halmost half of these newly arrived works dating from 1917 to 1925, the rare s tand most sought-after period of the art i s t ’s care e r.The lyrical subjects of thep h o t ographs include ornate interi o rs and detailed architectural exteri o rs , t h eold royal park of Saint-Cloud, and the beguilingly ordinary street scenes ofParis for which Atget is know n .These works complement the Getty’s col-lection of photographs of old Pa ris by Charles Marville and those of NewYork by Berenice A b b o t t . Also added we re eight rare daguerreotypes made

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< OPPOSITE PAGE:

TOP. GIOVANNI BATTISTA PIRANESI. An AncientPort, 1749–50. Red and black chalk and brown andreddish wash, squared in black chalk. (JPGM) From the exhibition D rawing Italy in the Age of theG rand To u r.

BOTTOM LEFT. U N K N OW N . H e raldic Panel with theArms of the Eberler Fa m i l y, ca. 148 0 – 9 0. Pot meta land clear glass, green flashed glass, brown vitre o u spa i nt, silver stain. (J P G M )

BOTTOM RIGHT. VIENNA MASTER OF MARY OFB U RG U N DY. A l exander Ta kes the Hand of Roxa n n e(d eta i l ) . Q u i ntus Cu rtius Ru f u s, L i v re des fa i sd ’A l exa n d re le gra nt (Book of the Deeds of Alexa n d e rthe Grea t), Bruges, 1468–70. Te m p e ra co l o rs, goldleaf, gold paint, and ink on parchment. Ms. fr.22547, fol. 195 v. (Bi b l i othèque nationale de Fra n ce)From the exhibition Illuminating the Re n a i ssa n ce: Th eTriumph of Flemish Manusc r i pt Pa i nting in Eu ro p e.

MEINDERT HOBBEMA. A Wooded Landscape withTravelers on a Path through a Hamlet, ca. 1665.Oil on canvas. (JPGM)

EUGÈNE ATG E T. I r i s, ca. 191 0. Albumen silver print. (J P G M )

by French photogr a p hy pioneer Jo s e p h - P h i l i b e rt Girault de Prangey. T h eyinclude the earliest surv iving photograph of the Pa rthenon and other ancientm o numents in Gre e c e, I t a l y, and Lebanon.

D O N AT I O N S

While the Getty’s collection grew with new purchases, there were also asubstantial number of donations made to the Museum. During this periodover 400 objects, ranging from antiquities to medieval manuscripts to pho-tographs, were given to the Museum in recognition of the Getty’s positionas an important repository of great works of art.A large proportion of thesedonations were photographic works.These included a group of 172 pho-tographs by William Eggleston made between 1971 and 1980, two black-and-white Polaroids by Andy Warhol, and a portrait of the sculptor HenryMoore, a gift from photographer Richard Avedon.

E X H I B I T I O N S A N D D I S P L AYS —— B R I N G I N G A W O R L D O F A R T T O L O S A N G E L E SOver 30 exhibitions were presented by the Museum during this period,r a n ging from small focused shows and rotating displays of art from the perm a-n e n t collection to large-scale international loan pre s e n t a t i o n s . Exhibitions a tthe Getty Research Institute, which are tailored with a scholarly audience inm i n d , are discussed on page 39.

Premiere Presentations

Framing the Getty’s schedule each year is a select group of exhibitions des-ignated as Pre m i e re Pre s e n t a t i o n s , marking the most important shows ofthe season.

In this re p o rt peri o d , the Pre m i e re Presentations included the intern a-tional exhibition Illuminating the Renaissance:The Triumph of Flemish Manuscri p tPainting in Europe. Ten ye a rs in the making, the exhibition was one of themost ambitious and compre h e n s ive shows organized in the history of theG e t t y. It showcased the Museum’s collection of Flemish manu s c ri p t s , w h i c his among the best in the wo r l d , along with objects brought together from m o rethan 50 lenders in 14 countri e s . Fe a t u red we re over 130 rare masterwo r k s t h a thad never been seen tog e t h e r, including manu s c ripts that had not been pub-licly displayed because of their fragile and delicate condition.Organized by theGetty Museum, the Royal A c a d e my of A rts in London, and the Bri t i s hL i b r a ry, Illuminating the Renaissance is an example of what the Getty’s collab-o r a t ive spirit can pro d u c e.

Influenced by the Renaissance but contemporary in medium, the wo r kof video artist Bill Viola was the subject of another Premiere Presentation,Bill V i o l a :The Pa s s i o n s. I n s p i red by V i o l a ’s participation in the Getty Researc hInstitute 1997–98 scholar ye a r, which explored the theme “ R e p re s e n ting thePassions,” the exhibition revealed the unique synergy among the d i f f e re n tp rograms at the Getty.While a scholar at the R e s e a rc h I n s t i t u t e,Viola fre-q u e n t e d the Museum’s galleries to study the Getty’s collection of medievaland Renaissance devotional paintings.This led to the creation of works in thee x h i b i t i o n , including E m e r g e n c e ( 2 0 0 2 ), jointly commissioned by the Museumand the Research Institute. Based on a 15th-century Italian fresco painting ofChrist being supported in the sarcophagus, Viola’s video work s h ows adeathly pale man rising to the surface of a well as two women hold him.

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> OPPOSITE PAGE. BILL VIOLA. Emergence, 2002.Video installation. (JPGM) Photo: Kira Perov

RICHARD AVEDON. Henry Moore, Sculptor,January 26, 1963, 1963. Gelatin silver print.© Richard Avedon. Gift of the artist. (JPGM)

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In The Pa s s i o n s,Viola explored the range of emotional states by filminga c t o rs at ve ry high speeds and then re p l aying the action on large pro j e c t i o nscreens and plasma monitors in extreme slow motion. Over three months,nearly 150,000 visitors made the intense journey through the darkness ofthe Getty’s galleries to encounter raw expressions of passions in all theirminute detail.

Small Gems and Big Themes

Containing just three paintings, the Getty exhibition O razio Gentileschi inG e n o a : Paintings for the Pa l a z zo Sauli reunited one of the Museum’s finestItalian Baroque paintings, G e n t i l e s c h i ’s Lot and His Daughters, with its ori gi-nal pendants:Danaë and the Shower of Gold and Saint Mary Magdalen in Ecstasy,n ow both privately ow n e d . Gentileschi had established his fame with these

t h ree paintings, c reated between 1621 and 1623, for a we a l t hyp a t ron in Genoa.The Museum’s relationships with private col-l e c t o rs allowed the staging of this re u n i o n , o f f e ring the publ i can extraord i n a ry opportunity to see these three magnificentworks together again, as they we re meant to be enjoye d .

This period also saw the presentation of three closely inter-related small exhibitions—Rome on the Grand To u r, D rawing Italyin the Age of the Grand To u r, a n d Naples and Vesuvius and the Gra n dTour—unified by a big theme.The “Grand Tour” was an edu-cational journey undertaken by young 18th-century Britishtravelers hoping to acquire noble ideas and moral virtue

through exposure to the classical past.Along the way, these cultural touristswould collect and commission works from artists. The three exhibitionsimaginatively drew upon the collections of the Museum and the GettyResearch Institute, as well as other local collections, to explore aspects ofthis rite of passage. Displays included travelers’ guidebooks, souvenirs, andview paintings and prints that were the postcards of the time.

Another highlight was a pair of exhibitions that explored the stark re a l i-ties of life in Depression-era A m e ri c a . About Life:The Photographs of DorotheaL a n g e and The Gra p e s of W ra t h : H o race Bri s t o l ’s California Photogra p h s we re pre-sented concurrently to offer a dramatic pictorial history of this dark A m e ri c a ne x p e rience and to illustrate the development and power of the social docu-m e n t a ry tradition. Getty Center visitors we re able to compare the wo r k s , s e eL a n g e ’s influence on Bri s t o l , and trace the effects of both photogr a p h e rs oncountless other art i s t s , including those working in film and literature.

ORAZIO GENTILESCHI. Lot and His Daughters,ca. 1622. Oil on canvas. (JPGM)

ORAZIO GENTILESCHI. Danaë and the Shower of Gold,1621–23. Oil on canvas. (Richard L. Feigen, New York)

ORAZIO GENTILESCHI. Saint Mary Magdalen inEcstasy, 1621–23. Oil on canvas. (Private collection)

In this report period, nearly

150,000 people came to the

Getty Center to attend some 200

public events designed to enrich and

extend the art experience beyond

the exhibition galleries.

H E A R I N G A R T

In this re p o rt peri o d , nearly 150,000 people came to the Getty Center toattend some 200 public events designed to enrich and extend the art expe-rience beyond the exhibition galleri e s .The popular Gordon Getty ConcertSeries, which encourages visitors to “hear” art, features period or cultural-ly diverse music tailored to accompany special exhibitions.These concertstransport audiences into the realm of the artist.

D u ring this re p o rt peri o d , the Gordon Getty Concert Series feature dthe early music ensemble Musica Angelica to complement the I l l u m i n a t i n gthe Renaissance P re m i e re Pre s e n t a t i o n.The group re c reated works by gre a tRenaissance composers using instruments such as flutes, o r g a n , s p i n e t , l u t e s ,viola da gamba, and the hurd y - g u rd y.The series also presented three singer-s o n g w ri t e rs from Te x a s ,O h i o, and Tennessee who mounted a musical odysseyt h ey called “ F rom the Dustbowl to Nashville” in reaction to theD e p ression-era images featured in the exhibition About Life: The Photogra p h so f Dorothea Lange. The concert offered blues-tinted country and dusty ro c k -a n d - roll as a mu s i c a l t ri bute to the great photogr a p h e r.

The Gordon Getty Concert Series is just one of hundreds of ongoingevents that continue to draw crowds to the Getty Center.Other public pre-s e n t a t i o n s , including spoken-word performances, lectures, workshops, films c re e n i n g s , and childre n ’s progr a m m i n g , offer Getty visitors multiple ave nu e sto approach and enjoy art.

M o n ey Mark performed as pa rt of the Fr i d ay N i g hts at the Getty series, which features eclectic performances. Photo: Marina Chavez

The early music ensemble Musica Angelica onstageat the Getty Center. Photo: Craig Schwartz