The Art of Compromise: The Paradox of Place at
the Getty
Irregularly scattered
atop a hill in the Santa Monica Mountains, the Getty Center is an impressive
collection of glass, metal and travertine with corners that project outward
towards expansive city views framed and controlled throughout by the sharp
angles of architect Richard Meier’s equidistant grid design. A mesh of squares
and circles that interlock like Legos, the architecture stands erect, yet
standoffish, a bold corporate statement lacking a central theme.
Once you arrive
at the Getty, you are forced from the start to abandon your car, and either
take a fifteen minute walk up the hill or ride a Disneyland-like tram up to
a welcoming plaza. Meier’s design, as he envisioned it, was intended to give
visitors the feeling that they were being elevated out of their everyday experience
while, at the same time, providing them with a powerful sense of being in
the center of Los Angeles.
The theme of
rising up to the Getty is reminiscent of climbing up to the ancient Greek
Acropolis—the central edifice defining the polis
or city-state, the seat of democratic government. However, in the case of
the Getty, this Art-Acropolis, is
not the showy, dominating, patriarchal space of the Greeks. Instead, the Getty’s
square columns co-exist with the gentle curves of the stark white rotundas
and earth tone rough travertine suggesting the feminine. These contrasting
elements link together the sky (rising upward) and the earth (reaching downward).
Connecting this natural order further, the campus sits comfortably into the
surrounding landscape with the central rotunda situated on the spot where
two ridges on the hillside intersect. Volume and space are equal suggesting
that there is harmony and balance.
While I was
studying theater at UCLA nearly two decades ago, I took a course in the Classics
Department titled, “The Female in Antiquity.” The class was extraordinary
as it provided a unique perspective regarding Greek society that had not been
directly discussed in the theater history courses I had taken. Primarily utilizing
excerpts from extant Greek texts, the course emphasized how separate the lives
of the men and women of ancient Greece were and the dominant male culture’s
emphasis on the power of the phallus. This prominent masculine symbol was
evident in our examination of the ancient Greek Acropolis, an architectural
masterpiece that provided a stunning visual representation of the supremacy
of male dominance and separate existence away from the confines of the home.
With its phallic columns rising upward, stark open simplicity, and high-on-the-hill
design, the Acropolis is in character with the ancient Greek male existence
of spending an inordinate amount of time living out-of-doors. Physical or
mental, the Greek man’s space was one of control, hierarchy and conquest—a
sprawling and full space, while
a women’s space was confined to the oikos,
or home, where she was relegated to the invisible private sphere—a confining
and empty space.
This male/female
split in the social order was also reflected in Greek myth and ritual, where
male sky gods (e.g., Zeus and Apollo) ruled from the heights of Mt. Olympus
and were worshipped openly in grand and spacious temples. In contrast, female
fertility deities (e.g., Demeter and Kore) were relegated to the earth and
void of the Underworld, and their worship was conducted in darkened shrines
and shrouded in mysteries. An important
exception to this rule is the figure of Athena, a powerful, non-domesticated virgin warrior goddess
who was produced without a mother
from the head of Zeus. It is the temple of Athena, after all – the Parthenon
– that dominates the Acropolis. But Athena is no ordinary woman. As the patron
goddess of the city, her power is not confined or limited to the feminine
realm of home and hearth but to the masculine world of political action and
military power. As such, she does not represent a balance of male and female
elements but has become fully masculinized in the artistic and architectural
space of the Acropolis. Though female in gender, she is totally male in function
and form.
This idea of
being invisible or removed or of sinking towards the ground rather than elevated
to the sky is a recurring theme in the Getty’s design. Visitors exit the tram
at the top of the hill, and must decide to go up
to reach the galleries (to the sky) or go down
to reach the gardens (the earth). The fountain in the main courtyard contains
massive, blue-veined marble boulders, native bedrock shaped by nature (or
by “Mother Earth”) contrasted with the imported travertine split by humans
(or shaped through brute, domineering force). A walk in the garden is achieved
by following a gentle maze of circular pathways that contrasts sharply against
the steep linear steps that reach up to high walkways that connect the gallery
floors. While zigzagging down into the bowl at the south end of the garden
towards the reflecting pool, the Getty buildings rise high above taking command
of the skyline.
Additionally,
there is a massive fountain formed in an erect oval shape framed by travertine
walls while above water hemorrhages profusely
down into a bowl through a circular vent that opens to the sky. There are
rooms contained within the Center that are actually carved below inside the mountain suggesting a kind of subterranean netherworld
tucked comfortably out-of-sight and out-of-mind. If you come towards the Getty
from the 405 freeway below, there is never an instance when its massive structure
can be seen in full view, and, at times, the buildings seem to disappear once
approaching a corner. Both visually
and structurally, then, the Getty – unlike the Acropolis - attempts to achieve
a balance of male and female elements without sacrificing one at the expense
of the other.
Meier’s vision
that the Getty be designed with the intent to inspire, a place set apart from
the normal and routine, is also true of Greek temples as well as magnificent
natural environments like the Grand Canyon. In each instance, the power of
place enriches our imagination and sense of self so that we often feel transported
to an extraordinary place. All sensory elements combine to create a sense
of wholeness and completeness. However, if any of the parts are compromised,
then the experience of the moment can be jarred.
As an environmentalist
representing the Sierra Club in restoring natural quiet to Grand Canyon National
Park, I was referred by one of my fellow “quiet commandos” to the work of
philosopher and environmentalist, Jack Turner. In an essay titled “the Maze
and the Aura,”1 Turner describes
the desire of contemporary society to reject natural order and, instead, accept
its reproduction. Processes are diminished as human beings attempt to spatially
connect their world closer to mass tourism than to the authority of the natural
world. Furthermore, Turner observes that in our modern world creating a harmonious
balance of both natural and human-made elements is often compromised by a
disruption in aura. Noise interrupts
and nullifies the feeling of being out-of-doors just as sounds emanating from
the surrounding city disrupt the Getty’s unique existence at the place where
it happens to be. This concept can be illustrated by taking a walk directly
to the Getty’s south end where you are confronted by a simple rectangular
portal, between two pavilions of the museum, that gives the illusion of opening
into thin air, and then leads to a wonderful long parapet, from which you
can look across to the ocean or down to an elegant cactus garden. If you look
above, you can sometimes see the moon framed by nothing but blue sky. Ideally,
this should be an experience of spiritual elevation or contemplation – the
feeling of wholeness – but the aura is too often marred by the deafening
noise from the airplanes above.
Although the Getty’s natural surroundings have been compromised by
the noise of the city, the museum does provide a space for reflection and
inspiration. Walking through a gallery and becoming acquainted with a masterwork
firsthand can be an exhiliarting and uplifting experience. The Parthenon,
however, is a different matter. Tourists from all over the world flock to
Athens to view this massive Greek structure, thereby diminishing its ancient
tradition which, in turn, aids in a loss of aura.
The importance of ritual, authority, and most importantly, as Turner points
out referring to an essay by Walter Benjamin, “the quality of its presence
is always depreciated.” Turner defines this uniquely human experience as passing
into the realm of exhibition. Today the Parthenon is less a sacred temple
than it is an object on display, fragmented, like the Getty is, by the sights,
sounds, and presence of the city that surrounds it.
1 Turner, Jack, “The Maze and the Aura.” The Abstract Wild (Arizona: University of Tucson Press), 1996.