Head of Getty Museum to Leave Sept. 30

John Walsh, director of the J. Paul Getty Museum since 1983, has resigned effective Sept. 30, The Times has learned. He will also retire on that date from his post as vice president of the $5-billion Getty Trust, which oversees the museum.

Walsh’s impending departure had been rumored for several months, but the 62-year-old scholar of 17th century Dutch painting always refused to discuss his plans. On Thursday, he began to formally notify colleagues and associates of his decision.

He will be succeeded by chief curator Deborah Gribbon, who has held the position of deputy director for two years and has been responsible for daily museum administration during that time.

Walsh and Gribbon could not be reached for comment Saturday.

In a letter to museum colleagues informing them of his decision and obtained by The Times, Walsh wrote, “My plan is not to take another job--I’ve been employed nonstop for 35-odd years--but instead, after a bit of decompression, to turn to several book projects I have hoped to find time for.” He described the decision as “a completely happy event.”

According to the letter, the transition had been planned two years ago, after the Getty Museum moved into its lavish new quarters in Brentwood. Walsh took an active part in shaping the interior galleries of the new museum building, designed by internationally known American Modernist architect Richard Meier.

Walsh’s battles with Meier over design of the galleries were chronicled in the documentary film “Concert of Wills.” The traditional Beaux Arts-style picture galleries Walsh wanted finally opened to great acclaim.

During his 17-year tenure as director Walsh also oversaw major expansion of the museum’s narrow and uneven collection, which upon his arrival was strong only in classical antiquities and 18th century French furniture and decorative arts.

In 1983 he completed purchase of the legendary Ludwig Collection of 144 medieval manuscripts. Since then the Getty’s manuscript collection has grown into one of the greatest in the nation, perhaps second only to that of New York’s Morgan Library, which was founded early last century.

The following year, Walsh opened a new collecting field for the museum with the simultaneous purchase of seven of the world’s most important private collections of photographs, making Los Angeles a primary international center for the study of camera images.

One sought-after prize eluded Walsh: Despite a four-year struggle to acquire Antonio Canova’s seminal Neoclassical sculpture “The Three Graces,” the Getty was finally foiled by maneuvers of the British government, which skirted laws in order to refuse an export license.

A second major purchase--an ancient Greek sculpture of a standing youth now known as the Getty Kouros, for which the museum reportedly paid $20 million--has been shrouded in controversy as to its authenticity. Its museum label now reads, “Circa 530 BC or modern forgery.”

Walsh, who previously was curator of European painting at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, also introduced contemporary art to the Getty Center, principally through commissions of permanent works around the Brentwood campus by noted American artists Robert Irwin, Martin Puryear, Edward Ruscha and Alexis Smith.

Gribbon, formerly curator of the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston, will assume the directorship of the Getty Museum and vice presidency of the Getty Trust on Oct 1. The Getty will become one of the nation’s few major art museums with a woman at the helm.