Their Mission: Make the World a Better Place for Art

Miguel Angel Corzo

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“We have a very clearly defined mission, which is to work internationally to create awareness of the importance of the world’s cultural heritage and its conservation, for the use and enrichment of present and future generations,” says Miguel Angel Corzo, director of the Getty Conservation Institute. “That’s it; no five-page statement.”

But carrying out that mission is complicated. With 130 projects currently underway in 35 countries, the institute is helping to conserve a royal tomb in Egypt’s Valley of the Queens, cliff-side grottos filled with Buddhist art in Dunhuang, China, and a mural by Mexican artist David Alfaro Siqueiros on Los Angeles’ historic Olvera Street. The institute is also working with the government of Benin to save bas-reliefs in the royal palaces of Abomey depicting the history and culture of the Fon people, and collaborating with UCLA and the Belize government to preserve the ancient Maya ceremonial center of Xunantunich.

Meanwhile, in laboratories at the new Getty Center, scientists are focusing on conservation methods for tropical countries, whose rich collections and archeological sites are under extreme threat of destruction.

Although largely known for ambitious field projects and research, the conservation institute “has evolved from a treatment-oriented institute to an ideas- and impact-oriented institute,” Corzo says. A native of Mexico who was educated at UCLA and Harvard University, he served as president and CEO of the Friends of the Arts of Mexico Foundation, where he organized the 1990-91 blockbuster exhibition “Mexico: Splendor of Thirty Centuries,” before taking charge of the conservation institute in 1991.

It’s impossible to patch up all the world’s crumbling monuments, so the institute leverages its efforts through international partnerships and collaborations, advocates preventive conservation through training programs and looks for new ways to create a sense of urgency about an overwhelming challenge. While dispensing information to specialists through conferences and publications--as might be expected--the institute also reaches out to young people in programs that increase their appreciation of landmarks in their own communities.

“We need to understand how the cultural heritage serves us, not only economically but in terms of its intrinsic value to our daily lives,” Corzo says.

Leilani Lattin Duke

“Most people are not against art education in the classroom. That’s not the issue,” says Leilani Lattin Duke, director of the Getty Education Institute, which devotes its resources to improving the quality and status of arts education in American elementary and secondary schools.

“The issue is instructional time and the number of subjects and issues that different constituencies expect the schools to address. Competition is worse than ever before because schools have assumed more custodial and social responsibilities, and the school day has not lengthened.”

The institute promotes its cause by collaborating with national education organizations, presenting staff development programs for teachers and developing and publishing instructional resources, says Duke. Before joining the Getty Trust in 1981, Duke worked for the National Endowment for the Arts and directed the California Confederation of the Arts.

Yes, inroads have been made in winning recognition of the value of arts education among policy leaders at both national and state levels, she says. “In addition, the commercial publishing industry is producing more textbooks and curriculum materials on the arts than ever before, and I’m constantly hearing from people who want to do children’s television and radio programs on the arts.”

Duke attributes these gains to a shift in how arts education is defined. “The emphasis is not only on the production or the performance anymore,” she says. “Arts education is a much greater, holistic enterprise within a broad context. The public has begun to see it as a real, substantive subject, as opposed to something that’s merely recreational.”

Still, tough challenges persist. For one thing, teachers are still being taught by the old system, concentrating on making art for self-expression or recreation rather than treating art as a solid subject that relates to other disciplines. “Until we get colleges of education and art to change the way they train teachers, we will remain in the business of remedial education when we do in-service staff education,” she says.

Much of the institute’s work goes on in schools and offices all across the country, but Duke believes that having a headquarters at the Getty Center will help the cause. “We can build upon the attraction of people wanting to come here,” she says. “Providing a visceral experience with art helps to open up a window with school administrators, policymakers and parents. The critical mass of this place sends the message that somebody with a lot of money and influence thinks art is important.”

Elean E. Fink

The Getty name conjures thoughts of old art and hallowed traditions, but the Getty Information Institute is keenly attuned to the future. Equipped with all the expertise and bells and whistles of the digital age, the institute is dedicated to enhancing world wide access to cultural heritage information by means of computer technology.

“We are committed to ensuring that arts and humanities information has a strong presence on emerging communications networks,” says institute director Eleanor E. Fink. She came to the Getty Information Institute in 1987, first serving as a program manager, then as acting director and finally director in 1994.

In its early years, the information institute concentrated on developing databases for art history research and education, including the “Bibliography of the History of Art,” the “Provenance Index” and the “Avery Index to Architectural Periodicals.” To improve international communications in a field where terminology can be extremely confusing, the institute also has published the “Art & Architecture Thesaurus,” a research guide to cultural heritage; the “Union List of Artist Names,” containing more than 200,000 name forms and alternate spellings; and the “Thesaurus of Geographic Names,” citing 300,000 modern and 15,000 historic places.

The institute still produces research tools, but its focus has shifted to issues and policies resulting from the ever-growing environment of digital networks, Fink says. “Our reach is much broader now. It isn’t just scholars who access our databases. Part of the excitement about the Internet and the World Wide Web is the fact that networks do not know boundaries. What we are aiming at is universal access to images and art information.”

Deborah Marrow

“Need money? Ask the Getty.” Or so goes a popular misconception among those who think the J. Paul Getty Trust was established to give away its wealth. In fact, the Getty Grant Program is the only branch of the trust that actually funds outside projects. What’s more, it was something of an afterthought in trust president Harold M. Williams’ grand plan for the Getty fortune.

Founded in 1984, a year later than the Getty’s institutes for art education, research, conservation and information, the grant program was designed to strengthen the institutes’ activities by supporting projects all over the world, program director Deborah Marrow says. She joined the Getty in 1983, serving as publications coordinator, program officer and assistant director of the Grant Program before becoming director in 1989.

“In 13 years, the program has grown from a small grant provider into a major international funder,” she says. To date, the program has made about 1,700 grants in 135 countries, totaling nearly $70 million. Marrow and her 13-member staff--in consultation with hundreds of outside advisers--currently give away about $7 million a year, mostly in grants of less than $50,000. “We are firm believers that the small, well-placed grant for a model project can have a big impact,” she says.

Getty grants have supported a computer-enhanced reconstruction and study of 8th century Mayan murals at Bonampak in Chiapas, Mexico; foreign study for Eastern European scholars after the Berlin Wall was dismantled; a conservation study of mosaics in Rome’s Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore; training in preventive conservation for museum personnel in Africa; and research on the Philadelphia Museum of Art’s collection of Italian paintings.

In Southern California, grants have funded a conservation survey of the Huntington Museum’s British paintings and a multicultural program providing summer internships in cultural institutions.

Beefing up its local presence, this past July the program launched two funding initiatives for Los Angeles-area visual arts institutions. One offers funds to evaluate operations, programs and finances and to develop long-term strategies for development; the other helps digitize local art collections. “We hope to get L.A. collections online and make them more accessible,” Marrow says.

Salvatore Settis

Lodged in a spectacular circular building, the Getty Research Institute has a large presence at the Getty Center, second only to the museum’s. Scholars are likely to beat a path to the institute’s vast research library, while members of the public discover that they can use the reading room, attend lectures in the 120-seat auditorium and peruse selections from the collection in a small exhibition space.

Established as a center of interdisciplinary scholarship in the arts and humanities, the institute is rooted at the old Getty Museum in Malibu. “The museum compiled a curatorial collection of 40,000 books and 100,000 photographs. Now we have 800,000 books and more than 2 million photographs,” says institute director Salvatore Settis. An Italian scholar of ancient and Renaissance art, he served as a Getty consultant and scholar before joining the staff in 1994.

The collection has grown in scope as well as size, now encompassing religion, history, ethnography and the history of science along with art and architecture. Buying up large private holdings at an astonishing speed, the institute also has assembled special collections--rare books, artists’ books, manuscripts, prints and drawings--and it has acquired archives from artists, art historians, archeologists and conservators.

“Another change is that this is not just a library but a place to produce scholarship,” Settis says. Hosting seasoned scholars and pre-doctoral and postdoctoral fellows, the institute spices the predictable mix of art historians with photographers, musicians, writers and scientists, all of whom present their ideas in seminars and public programs. “We are not just giving them free time for research and writing, but trying to promote contact among them and provide a mechanism that will cause their scholarship to change,” he says.

Reaching beyond its walls, the institute publishes books on its collections, organizes traveling exhibitions and collaborates on programs with other institutions. These activities provide tangible results, while the move to the Getty Center opens doors to future explorations, Settis says with a burst of enthusiasm. “The tension between the excitement of doing something and seeing it take concrete form, that’s what I like.”