Getty Research Institute

The Getty Research Institute exists to bring together all the resources and activities required to advance understanding of the visual arts taken in their widest possible significance.

The foundation of the Institute lies in the special collections of original documents and objects from the Renaissance to the present, paralleled by a superb general art library, both of them growing according to the changing needs of researchers. An international residential scholar program each year brings together some of the best minds from all disciplines, including creative artists, to address and debate themes of particular intellectual urgency. Institute publications, both print and electronic, disseminate the work of the Institute and foster innovative research wherever it is found. The databases the Institute produces--dedicated to the highest standards of completeness, accuracy, and technical sophistication--provide essential resources for researchers, librarians, and museum professionals all over the world. Cataloging tools, digital library resources, and personal assistance ensure the best access to information for resident and extended communities. Exhibitions, conferences, workshops, and lectures give compelling expression to innovative scholarship and thought. Each of these functions guides and sustains all the others, an institutional transparency physically embodied in the remarkable circular architecture of the Institute building.

The work of the Institute takes its place within the collaborative context of the Getty Center as a whole, which includes the collections of the J. Paul Getty Museum, the international projects and research of the Conservation Institute, and the philanthropic outreach of the Grant Program.

The Institute uses STAR to provide web-based assess to a number of databases. The Provenance Index Databases contain information related to the history of collecting and the provenance of individual works of art, primarily Western European paintings from the 16th to the 20th century. The databases contain indexed transcriptions of archival documents, sale catalogs, and museum provenance files from all over the world. They assist in establishing the history of ownership of works of art.

URL:
www.getty.edu/research/conducting_research/provenance_index/

The Photo Study Collection Database contains approximately two million photographs, primarily black and white, that document works of art and architecture. The Photo Study Collection Database represents approximately half of the photographic holdings.

URL:
www.getty.edu/research/conducting_research/photo_study_collection/

Digitized Library Collections feature special collections from the Research Library, to complement a Research Institute exhibition or focus on a particular artist, subject, collection, or group of collections. Four collections are currently accessible: Early Photography in Greece and the Mediterranean, Festivals, A Nation Emerges: Sixty-five Years of Photography in Mexico, and Prints after Poussin.

URL: www.getty.edu/research/conducting_research/digitized_collections/

The Collectors Files comprise about 20,000 folders with information on international collectors, dealers, auctioneers, and art institutions from the late Middle Ages to the present.

URL: www.getty.edu/research/conducting_ research/provenance_index/collectors_files.html