The Getty Villa is an educational center and an art museum located at the easterly end of the Malibu coast in the Pacific Palisades neighborhood of

Los Angeles Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

, California, United States. One of two campuses of the J. Paul Getty Museum, the Getty Villa is dedicated to the study of the arts and

cultures Culture ( ) is a concept that encompasses the social behavior, institutions, and Social norm, norms found in human societies, as well as the knowledge, beliefs, arts, laws, Social norm, customs, capabilities, Attitude (psychology), attitudes ...

ancient Greece Ancient Greece () was a northeastern Mediterranean civilization, existing from the Greek Dark Ages of the 12th–9th centuries BC to the end of classical antiquity (), that comprised a loose collection of culturally and linguistically r ...

Rome Rome (Italian language, Italian and , ) is the capital city and most populated (municipality) of Italy. It is also the administrative centre of the Lazio Regions of Italy, region and of the Metropolitan City of Rome. A special named with 2, ...

, and

Etruria Etruria ( ) was a region of Central Italy delimited by the rivers Arno and Tiber, an area that covered what is now most of Tuscany, northern Lazio, and north-western Umbria. It was inhabited by the Etruscans, an ancient civilization that f ...

. The collection has 44,000 Greek, Roman, and

Etruscan __NOTOC__ Etruscan may refer to: Ancient civilization *Etruscan civilization (1st millennium BC) and related things: **Etruscan language ** Etruscan architecture **Etruscan art **Etruscan cities **Etruscan coins **Etruscan history **Etruscan myt ...

antiquities dating from 6,500 BC to 400 AD, including the

Lansdowne Heracles The ''Lansdowne Heracles'' is a Roman marble sculpture of about 125 CE. Today it is in the collection of the J. Paul Getty Museum's Getty Villa on the Malibu Coast, Los Angeles, California, Los Angeles. The statue represents the hero Heracles as ...

and the

Victorious Youth The ''Victorious Youth'', also known as the , the or the ''Getty Bronze'', is a Ancient Greek sculpture, Greek bronze sculpture, made between 300 and 100 BCE, in the collections of the J. Paul Getty Museum, displayed at the Getty Villa in Pacifi ...

. The UCLA/Getty Master's Program in Archaeological and Ethnographic Conservation is housed on this campus.

History

In 1954, oil tycoon

J. Paul Getty Jean Paul Getty Sr. (; December 15, 1892 – June 6, 1976) was an American petroleum industrialist who founded the Getty Oil Company in 1942 and was the patriarch of the Getty family. A native of Minneapolis, Minnesota, he was the son of pion ...

opened a gallery adjacent to his home in Pacific Palisades. Quickly running out of room, he built a second museum, the Getty Villa, on the property down the hill from the original gallery. The villa design was inspired by the

Villa of the Papyri The Villa of the Papyri (, also known as ''Villa dei Pisoni'' and in early excavation records as the ''Villa Suburbana'') was an ancient Roman Empire, Roman villa in Herculaneum, in what is now Ercolano, southern Italy. It is named after its un ...

Herculaneum Herculaneum is an ancient Rome, ancient Roman town located in the modern-day ''comune'' of Ercolano, Campania, Italy. Herculaneum was buried under a massive pyroclastic flow in the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD. Like the nearby city of ...

and incorporated additional details from several other ancient sites. It was designed by architects Robert E. Langdon, Jr., and Ernest C. Wilson, Jr., in consultation with archeologist Norman Neuerburg. It opened in 1974, but was never visited by Getty, who died in 1976. Following his death, the museum inherited $661 million, and began planning a much larger campus, the

Getty Center The Getty Center, in Los Angeles, California, United States, is a campus of the Getty Museum and other programs of the Getty Trust. The $1.3 billion center opened to the public on December 16, 1997, and is well known for its architecture, garde ...

, in nearby Brentwood. The museum overcame neighborhood opposition to its new campus plan by agreeing to limit the total size of the development on the Getty Center site. To meet the museum's total space needs, the museum decided to split between the two locations with the Getty Villa housing the

Greek Greek may refer to: Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor of all kno ...

Roman Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of Roman civilization *Epistle to the Romans, shortened to Romans, a letter w ...

, and

antiquities. In 1993, the Getty Trust selected the Boston architects Rodolfo Machado and Jorge Silvetti to design a renovation of the Getty Villa and its campus. In 1997, portions of the museum's collection of Greek, Roman and Etruscan antiquities were moved to the Getty Center for display, and the Getty Villa was closed for renovation. The collection was restored during the renovation. In 2004, during the renovation, the museum and the

University of California, Los Angeles The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Its academic roots were established in 1881 as a normal school the ...

(UCLA), began holding summer institutes in Turkey, studying the conservation of Middle Eastern Art. Reopened on January 28, 2006, the Getty Villa shows Greek, Roman, and Etruscan antiquities within Roman-inspired architecture and surrounded by Roman-style gardens. The art is arranged by themes, e.g., ''Gods and Goddesses'', '' Dionysos and the Theater'', and ''Stories of the

Trojan War The Trojan War was a legendary conflict in Greek mythology that took place around the twelfth or thirteenth century BC. The war was waged by the Achaeans (Homer), Achaeans (Ancient Greece, Greeks) against the city of Troy after Paris (mytho ...

''. The new

architectural plan In architecture and building engineering, a floor plan is a technical drawing to scale, showing a view from above, of the relationships between rooms, spaces, traffic patterns, and other physical features at one level of a structure. Dimensio ...

surrounding the Villa – which was conceived by Machado and Silvetti Associates (who were also responsible for the plans for the renovated museum) – is designed to simulate an archaeological dig. ''

Architectural Record ''Architectural Record'' is a US-based monthly magazine dedicated to architecture and interior design. Its editor in chief is Josephine Minutillo. ''The Record'', as it is sometimes colloquially referred to, is widely-recognized as an important ...

'' has praised their work on the Getty Villa as "a near miracle – a museum that elicits no smirks from the art world ... a masterful job ... crafting a sophisticated ensemble of buildings, plazas, and landscaping that finally provides a real home for a relic of another time and place." In 2016–2018 the collection was reinstalled in a chronological arrangement emphasizing art-historical themes. There has been controversy surrounding the

and

Italian Italian(s) may refer to: * Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries ** Italians, a Romance ethnic group related to or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom ** Italian language, a Romance languag ...

governments' claim that objects in the collection were

looted Looting is the act of stealing, or the taking of goods by force, typically in the midst of a military, political, or other social crisis, such as war, natural disasters (where law and civil enforcement are temporarily ineffective), or rioting. ...

and should be repatriated. In 2006, the Getty returned or promised to return four looted objects to Greece: a

stele A stele ( ) or stela ( )The plural in English is sometimes stelai ( ) based on direct transliteration of the Greek, sometimes stelae or stelæ ( ) based on the inflection of Greek nouns in Latin, and sometimes anglicized to steles ( ) or stela ...

(grave marker), a marble relief, a gold funerary wreath, and a marble statue. In 2007, the Getty signed an agreement to return 40 looted items to Italy. The villa was host to leaders of the Western Hemisphere for dinner, held by President

Joe Biden Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. (born November 20, 1942) is an American politician who was the 46th president of the United States from 2021 to 2025. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he served as the 47th vice p ...

and First Lady

Jill Biden Jill Tracy Jacobs Biden (née Jacobs; born June 3, 1951) is an American educator who served as the first lady of the United States from 2021 to 2025 as the wife of President Joe Biden. She was second lady of the United States from 2009 to 20 ...

in honor of the 9th Summit of the Americas on June 9, 2022, which was a first for the Villa. On January 7, 2025, the

Los Angeles Fire Department The Los Angeles Fire Department (LAFD or LA City Fire) provides firefighting services and technical rescue services, hazardous materials services, and emergency medical services to the residents of the city of Los Angeles, California, United ...

reported that the villa's grounds caught fire as a result of the

Palisades Fire The Palisades Fire was a highly destructive wildfire that began burning in the Santa Monica Mountains of Los Angeles County, California, Los Angeles County on January 7, 2025, and grew to destroy large areas of Pacific Palisades, Los Angeles, P ...

, but no structures were damaged.

Facility and programs

The Getty Villa hosts live performances in both its indoor auditorium and its outdoor theatre. Indoor play-readings included ''The Trojan Women,'' Aristophanes' ''The Frogs,'' and Euripides' ''Helen''. Indoor musical performances, which typically relate to art exhibits, included: Musica Angelica, De Organographia, and Songs from the Fifth Age: Sones de México in Concert. The auditorium held a public reading of Homer's ''Iliad''. Outdoor performances included Aristophanes' ''Peace'', Aeschylus's ''Agamemnon'', and Sophocles' ''Elektra''. The Getty Villa hosts visiting exhibitions beyond its own collections. For example, in March 2011, it hosted "In Search of Biblical Lands", a photographic exhibition which included scenes of the Middle East dating back to the 1840s. The Getty Villa offers special educational programs for children. A special Family Forum gallery offers activities including decorating Greek vases and projecting shadows onto a screen that represents a Greek urn. The room also has polystyrene props from Greek and Roman culture for children to handle and use to cast shadows. The Getty Villa also offers children's guides to the other exhibits. The Getty Conservation Institute offers a Master's Program in Archaeological and Ethnographic Conservation in association with the Cotsen Institute of Archaeology at UCLA. Classes and research are conducted in the museum wing of the ranch house. The program was the first of its kind in the United States.

Campus

Pacific-Palisades-getty-villa-Aerial-from-west-August-2014

The Villa self-identifies with Malibu as it is located just east of the city limits of Malibu in the city of Los Angeles in the community of Pacific Palisades. The museum complex sits on a hill overlooking the Pacific Ocean, which is about from the entrance to the property. An outdoor entry pavilion is also built into the hill near the 248-car, four story, South Parking garage at the southern end of the Outer

Peristyle In ancient Ancient Greek architecture, Greek and Ancient Roman architecture, Roman architecture, a peristyle (; ) is a continuous porch formed by a row of columns surrounding the perimeter of a building or a courtyard. ''Tetrastoön'' () is a rare ...

. To the west of the Museum is a 450-seat outdoor Greek theater where evening performances are staged, named in honor of Barbara and Lawrence Fleischman. The theater faces the west side of the Villa and uses its entrance as a stage. To the northwest of the theatre is a three-story, building built into the hill that contains the museum store on the lower level, a cafe on the second level, and a private dining room on the top level. North of the Villa is a indoor 250-seat auditorium. On the hill above the museum are Getty's original private ranch house and the museum wing that Getty added to his home in 1954. They are now used for curatorial offices, meeting rooms and as a library. Although not open to the public, the campus includes J. Paul Getty's grave on the hill behind his ranch house. A 200-car North Parking Garage is behind the ranch complex. The museum building is arranged in a square opening into the Inner Peristyle courtyard. The 2006 museum renovation added 58 windows facing the Inner Peristyle and a retractable skylight over the atrium. It replaced the

terrazzo Terrazzo is a composite material, poured in place or precast, which is used for floor and wall treatments. It consists of chips of marble, quartz, granite, glass, or other suitable material, poured with a cementitious binder (for chemical bind ...

floors in the galleries and added seismic protection with new steel reinforcing beams and new isolators in the bases of statues and display cases. The museum has of gallery space. Writing in 2008, the architectural critic Calum Storrie described the overall effect:

What the Getty Villa achieves, first by seclusion, then by control of access, and ultimately through the architecture, is a sense of detachment from its immediate environment.

Gardens

There are four different gardens on the grounds of the Getty Villa, with plants native to the Mediterranean and known to have been cultivated by the ancient Romans. The largest garden is the Outer Peristyle, an exact proportional replica of the one at the Villa dei Papiri. The garden is , with a long pool at the center. Traditional Roman landscaping designs are replicated with manicured

bay laurel ''Laurus nobilis'' is an aromatic evergreen tree or large shrub with green, glabrous (smooth) leaves. It is in the flowering plant family Lauraceae. According to Flora Cretica (Kleinsteuber Books, 2024, ISBN 978-3-9818110-5-6) the stem can be 1 ...

boxwood ''Buxus'' is a genus of about seventy species in the family Buxaceae. Common names include box and boxwood. The boxes are native to western and southern Europe, southwest, southern and eastern Asia, Africa, Madagascar, northernmost So ...

oleander ''Nerium oleander'' ( ), commonly known as oleander or rosebay, is a shrub or small tree cultivated worldwide in temperate and subtropical areas as an ornamental and landscaping plant. It is the only species currently classified in the genus ...

, and

viburnum ''Viburnum'' is a genus of about 150–175 species of flowering plants in the moschatel family, Adoxaceae. Its current classification is based on molecular phylogeny. It was previously included in the honeysuckle family Caprifoliaceae. The memb ...

shrubs. There are rows of date palms lining each of the long sides of the Outer Peristyle garden. Each corner features

pomegranate The pomegranate (''Punica granatum'') is a fruit-bearing deciduous shrub in the family Lythraceae, subfamily Punica, Punicoideae, that grows between tall. Rich in symbolic and mythological associations in many cultures, it is thought to have o ...

trees surrounded by ornamental plants like acanthus,

ivy ''Hedera'', commonly called ivy (plural ivies), is a genus of 12–15 species of evergreen climbing or ground-creeping woody plants in the family Araliaceae, native to Western Europe, Central Europe, Southern Europe, Macaronesia, northwestern ...

hellebore Commonly known as hellebores (), the Eurasian genus ''Helleborus'' consists of approximately 20 species of herbaceous or evergreen perennial plant, perennial flowering plants in the family (biology), family Ranunculaceae, within which it gave i ...

lavender ''Lavandula'' (common name lavender) is a genus of 47 known species of perennial flowering plants in the sage family, Lamiaceae. It is native plant, native to the Old World, primarily found across the drier, warmer regions of the Mediterranean ...

, and iris. Copies of Roman bronzes excavated at the Villa dei Papiri and elsewhere are scattered throughout the garden. Getty Villa SW11

Just west of the Outer Peristyle is the Herb Garden, where traditional herbs sourced from ancient Roman texts are cultivated along with a variety of fruit trees: pomegranate, fig,

apricot An apricot (, ) is a fruit, or the tree that bears the fruit, of several species in the genus ''Prunus''. Usually an apricot is from the species '' P. armeniaca'', but the fruits of the other species in ''Prunus'' sect. ''Armeniaca'' are also ...

apple An apple is a round, edible fruit produced by an apple tree (''Malus'' spp.). Fruit trees of the orchard or domestic apple (''Malus domestica''), the most widely grown in the genus, are agriculture, cultivated worldwide. The tree originated ...

citrus ''Citrus'' is a genus of flowering trees and shrubs in the family Rutaceae. Plants in the genus produce citrus fruits, including important crops such as oranges, mandarins, lemons, grapefruits, pomelos, and limes. ''Citrus'' is nativ ...

, and

pear Pears are fruits produced and consumed around the world, growing on a tree and harvested in late summer into mid-autumn. The pear tree and shrub are a species of genus ''Pyrus'' , in the Family (biology), family Rosaceae, bearing the Pome, po ...

. The garden is surrounded by grapevines, and bounded by an olive grove planted on terraces above the garden. The East Garden is small and secluded, surrounded by laurel and

plane trees ''Platanus'' ( ) is a genus consisting of a small number of tree species native to the Northern Hemisphere. They are the sole living members of the family Platanaceae. All mature members of ''Platanus'' are tall, reaching in height. The type ...

. Its chief feature is an exact replica of the famous shell and

mosaic A mosaic () is a pattern or image made of small regular or irregular pieces of colored stone, glass or ceramic, held in place by plaster/Mortar (masonry), mortar, and covering a surface. Mosaics are often used as floor and wall decoration, and ...

fountain at the House of the Great Fountain in Pompeii, but there is also a circular fountain at the center of a basin filled with aquatic plants, around which the garden is oriented. The fourth and final garden is the Inner Peristyle. Like the Outer Peristyle, a long, narrow, marble lined pool forms the centerpiece of the landscaping. Along each side are replicas of bronze female statues from the Villa dei Papiri, modelled to appear as if they are drawing water from the pool. In each corner of the garden is a replica white marble fountain, and there are several bronze copies of famous Greek sculptures like the Doryphoros and busts of Greek philosophers like

Pythagoras Pythagoras of Samos (; BC) was an ancient Ionian Greek philosopher, polymath, and the eponymous founder of Pythagoreanism. His political and religious teachings were well known in Magna Graecia and influenced the philosophies of P ...

and

Democritus Democritus (, ; , ''Dēmókritos'', meaning "chosen of the people"; – ) was an Ancient Greece, Ancient Greek Pre-Socratic philosophy, pre-Socratic philosopher from Abdera, Thrace, Abdera, primarily remembered today for his formulation of an ...

Collection

The collection has 44,000 Greek, Roman, and Etruscan antiquities dating from 6,500 BC to 400 AD, of which approximately 1,400 are on view. Among the outstanding items is ''Victorious Youth'', one of few life-size Greek bronze statues to have survived to modern times. The

is a Hadrianic Roman sculpture in the manner of

Lysippus Lysippos (; ) was a Greek sculptor of the 4th century BC. Together with Scopas and Praxiteles, he is considered one of the three greatest sculptors of the Classical Greek era, bringing transition into the Hellenistic period In classical a ...

. The Villa has jewelry and coin collections and an extensive 20,000 volume library of books covering art from these periods. The Villa displays the Getty kouros, which the museum lists as "Greek, about 530 B.C., or modern forgery" because scientific analysis is inconclusive as to whether the marble statue can be dated to Greek times. If genuine, the Getty kouros is one of only twelve remaining intact lifesize

kouroi Kouros (, , plural kouroi) is the modern term given to free-standing Ancient Greek sculptures that depict nude male youths. They first appear in the Archaic period in Greece and are prominent in Attica and Boeotia, with a less frequent presenc ...

. The Marbury Hall Zeus is an tall marble statue that was recovered from ruins at Tivoli near Rome.

Gallery

File:060807-002-GettyVilla002.jpg, Outer Peristyle File:Getty Villa SW12.jpg, Outer Peristyle – architectural detail File:060807-006-GettyVilla005courtyard.jpg, Inner Peristyle File:060807-004-GettyVilla003gallery.jpg, Gallery within the Villa File:Lansdowne Herakles.JPG, The Lansdowne Herakles, part of the museum's collection File:Getty villa 175 (6571418459).jpg, Ancient

Roman glass Roman glass objects have been recovered across the Roman Empire in domestic, industrial and funerary contexts. Glass was used primarily for the production of vessels, although mosaic tiles and window glass were also produced. Roman glass producti ...

ware in the Getty Villa File:Kouros Real or Fake.jpg, Getty kouros, part of the museum's collection File:Zeus Getty Villa.jpg, Marbury Hall

Zeus Zeus (, ) is the chief deity of the List of Greek deities, Greek pantheon. He is a sky father, sky and thunder god in ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, mythology, who rules as king of the gods on Mount Olympus. Zeus is the child ...

, King of the Gods, at the Getty Villa File:Head of Athena Getty Villa.jpg,

Athena Athena or Athene, often given the epithet Pallas, is an ancient Greek religion, ancient Greek goddess associated with wisdom, warfare, and handicraft who was later syncretism, syncretized with the Roman goddess Minerva. Athena was regarde ...

, Goddess of war, civilization, wisdom, strength, strategy, crafts, justice and skill File:Getty Villa SW01.jpg, Roman-Egyptian Female Mummy Portrait File:Getty Villa SW02.jpg, Roman gold medallion File:Getty Villa SW03.jpg, Roman bronze statuette File:Getty Villa SW04.jpg, Roman fresco fragment of a peacock File:Getty Villa SW05.jpg, Roman head-shaped glass vessels File:Getty Villa SW06.jpg,

Venus Venus is the second planet from the Sun. It is often called Earth's "twin" or "sister" planet for having almost the same size and mass, and the closest orbit to Earth's. While both are rocky planets, Venus has an atmosphere much thicker ...

and

Eros Eros (, ; ) is the Greek god of love and sex. The Romans referred to him as Cupid or Amor. In the earliest account, he is a primordial god, while in later accounts he is the child of Aphrodite. He is usually presented as a handsome young ma ...

in Marble Room File:Getty Villa SW07.jpg, Statue of a Siren File:Getty Villa SW08.jpg, ''

'', part of the museum's collection File:Etruscan Lion and Swan.jpg,

amber pendant of a lion and a swan File:Etruscan Ring.jpg, Etruscan gold ring depicting a siren, sphinx, and hippocamp File:Getty Villa - Collection (5304880133).jpg, '' Grave Stele of Pollis'' (480 BC)

References

Works cited

* * * * * * *

External links

Getty.edu: official ''Getty Villa'' website

Getty.edu: J. Paul Getty Trust website
* – GNIS data
Vimeo.com: four-part documentary video about the Getty Villa and its Roman model, the Villa of the Papyri

Flickr.com: photos tagged with "Getty Villa"
{{Authority control * Art museums and galleries in Los Angeles Gardens in California Museums of ancient Rome in the United States Museums of ancient Greece in the United States Sculpture galleries in the United States Sculpture gardens, trails and parks in California Pacific Palisades, Los Angeles

Villa A villa is a type of house that was originally an ancient Roman upper class country house that provided an escape from urban life. Since its origins in the Roman villa, the idea and function of a villa have evolved considerably. After the f ...

Art museums and galleries established in 1954 1954 establishments in California Buildings and structures completed in 1974 1970s architecture in the United States Villas in the United States Replica buildings Landmarks in Los Angeles Culture of Los Angeles

History

Facility and programs

Campus

Gardens

Collection

Gallery

See also

References

Works cited

External links