Conceptual Botany
The art establishment is reeling over internecine shake-ups in the Getty Center administration, but playfulness still rules in the Getty garden. Since his first meeting a decade ago with the antically witty garden’s visionary creator, Los Angeles artist Robert Irwin, horticulturist Jim Duggan has been collaborating on the cultural must-see. His recent book, “Plants in the Getty’s Central Garden” (J. Paul Getty Museum, $19.95), catalogues the unorthodox plant choices that give the spiraling design its puzzle-within-a-puzzle otherworldliness. Duggan, who grew many of the selections from seed in his own Encinitas Gardens nursery and still walks the garden once a month with Irwin, talks about a work-in-progress.
How did you end up installing a botanical art piece at one of the world’s most famous museums?
A client of mine worked for the landscape architects hired to work with Bob [Irwin]. The design firm was having a hard time translating his artistic ideas into a garden. They had a long list of plants Bob had picked out of books. And most of these books had nothing to do with Southern California, because there aren’t many books on plants in Southern California.
How can that be so?
The past couple of years a few have come out, but Southern California is unique. It’s a dry coastal desert, folks. It doesn’t snow; it doesn’t get cold. The soils are very shallow, the water’s terrible and the sun shines out there. So he shows me this list and wants to know if I can get samples and grow them in my nursery so that the artist and landscape architects can see them over time. I was trying to make ends meet. I said, “Sure, I’m starving to death.” They twisted my arm and gave me a chunk of money. There were nearly 500 plants on this list.
Was it different from the usual horticulture gig right from the start?
I remember he mentioned this one grass the artist wanted to use; it was a very common weedy grass, and we both kind of chuckled. But later I spent a long time with Bob. We collected nearly 50 specimens of grass and grew them and analyzed them.
How did you get from the greenhouse to the Getty grounds?
Bob and I were hitting it off. The landscape architects noticed, “Hey, he can actually talk to Bob and understand what he’s saying.” They came to me one day and said, “Do you want to do the Getty with Bob?”
Is Robert Irwin an outside-the-planter-box gardener?
Always the question Bob comes back with is, where does this plant go from here? He’s looking at a plant in a one-gallon container and he doesn’t know if the plant is 10 feet tall or is deciduous or is going to flower later. That was and still is his most common question. He started teaching me artistic concepts, hue and value and intensity. He’s not approaching it from the plant viewpoint, but as a sculptor, painter or artist.
The Getty garden has had detractors from the start.
In the beginning there were a lot of tough criticisms. “Oh, you guys don’t know what you’re doing. These plants shouldn’t be in Southern California. It’s all going to die. . . .” “A lack of thought went into this. . . .” You may not like or understand what Bob is doing, but the last thing that’s going on is a lack of thought. There are deep-seated reasons behind everything going on in that garden space.
Given that plants were selected for how they would look years in the future, how is it turning out?
Boy, something’s working. The design changes a bit, but the original concept is still there. It’s even better than what we thought of.
You’re at the Getty every week, and you and Robert Irwin walk the garden once a month. Why not leave it to the groundskeepers?
A garden needs a gardener, hands-on, down on your knees. It’s a show garden, but it’s as beautiful and intimate as it is because we work the garden. Those plants know we love them. Busloads of children come through, and they come running through the garden. Any garden would love that.
