Photo: David Swanson/AFP/Getty Images.
The hillside along the Pacific Coast Highway burns in front of the driveway to the Getty Villa in the Pacific Palisades neighborhood in Los Angeles on Jan. 7.
Planning, courage, and commitment saved California’s Getty Museum in the last big conflagration, but how long can it escape what few others did?
Kelsey Ables at the Washington Post explained how the famous art collection was protected in January.
“As wildfires ravaged greater Los Angeles … the J. Paul Getty Museum faced encroaching flames on two fronts. Blazes nearly surrounded the Getty Villa in Pacific Palisades, coming within six feet of its walls. Days later, ominous red clouds were visible from the Getty Center in Brentwood, hovering on the horizon like a warning.
“The fire at the Villa was the closest flames had ever come to either building. But through it all, the institution made no evacuation plans. On the most intense nights at each location, a team of more than a dozen people at the Villa and 28 at the Center waited it out, and the museums’ vaunted artworks — the ancient sculptures, the Gentileschis, the Manets and Monets — remained inside.
“This was no gamble, though. Those familiar with the Getty describe it as a place one would evacuate to, rather than from.
“With the fire about a mile away from the Center on Jan. 10, a security staff member suggested to J. Paul Getty Trust chief executive Katherine Fleming that she might want to leave. ‘I was thinking, “I actually feel really good here,” ‘ she said in an interview. ‘This feels like a very safe place to be.’
“That is by design. … As the fires have killed more than 20 and razed swaths of the Los Angeles region, the Getty — with its more than $8 billion endowment — has emerged as a beacon of fire preparedness as well as a symbol of the defenses that wealth can build.
“From its grounds to the museum’s core, the $1.3 billion Getty Center, which was designed by architect Richard Meier and opened in 1997, was built to resist flames. …
“High on a hilltop, the campus has sprawling plazas made of fire-resistant travertine imported from Italy. Open spaces surround imposing, elevated buildings that boast walls constructed from reinforced concrete or fire-protected steel. The roofs are covered with stone aggregate, which is fire-resistant. Inside, the buildings are equipped with special doors that prevent flames from traveling. Temperature and humidity are closely monitored during red-flag warnings.
“Outside, the grounds are routinely cleared; the plants, selected for their drought-resistant qualities, are pruned regularly to prevent them from becoming fuel. During a previous fire, the museum said: ‘There is no need to evacuate the art or archives, because they are already in the safest place possible.’
“ ‘It’s very much like a fortress,’ said [Todd Cronan, an L.A. native and art history professor at Emory University in Atlanta], who briefly lived at the Center as a fellow. …
“To Cronan, though, the Getty’s unassailable features say ‘more about privatization and their … endowment than anything else,’ he wrote [by email].
“While the Getty stresses that it does not hire private firefighters or seek special treatment, it maintains its own water tanks — including a 1 million gallon tank at the Center — year-round. …
“When the Villa emerged largely unscathed last week, the museum in a press release credited its own ‘extensive efforts to clear brush from the surrounding area,’ noting that it also stores water on-site and that the grounds were irrigated ahead of the blaze. …
“Fleming, the CEO, said they were confident in their preparations but described a nail-biting evening watching the fire move closer as 15 staff members remained on-site. … The next day, with staff unharmed and the Villa still standing, Fleming found a strange calm in the collections. The galleries were ‘cleaner than an operating room.’ “
More at the Post, here.
Update April 4, 2025. The Getty is selling bonds to raise money for more protection. Article here.
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