The wind blew fiercely, sending a chill to my bones. We arrived at the Getty Center just before sunset. Ryan and I sat at the outdoor patio with a thermos of coffee and watched Getty patrons fight the wind. One girl turned in circlรงes in an attempt to escape the wind’s nestling of her hair. Another woman held the bottom edges of her skirt tightly in her fists as if she dared the wind to pick a row with her. We happily admired the passers-by, until the sun made his last mark on the day, smearing his honey greased fingers across the sandstone sides of the west pavilion, and finally sinking below the Malibu hills, at which point we wandered into our first gallery.
When we finished in the first gallery, traces of the sun had been wiped clean and the moon now shone in its place. (I love the Getty Center at dusk, because it offers beautiful views at sunset and moonrise.) The Getty sits on top of a hill overlooking west LA and downtown. As the sun sets on the west side, I like to look out at the diamond- encrusted surface of the Pacific Ocean. While the moon rises in the East, I like to peer out at the glimmering lights of an enlivened city and urban sea of cars below. High above and faraway from the chaos: LA looks beautiful.
(And the moonscape looked especially magnificent last night. The Santa Ana winds blew the clouds out to sea leaving a radiant night sky.)
In addition to the outward beauty that the Getty Center offers, it also possesses the inner beauty of its exhibits. Ryan and I went to see three of the exhibitions currently at the Getty: “Tango with Cows: Book Art of the Russian Avante-Garde,” “The Belle Heures of the Duke of Berry,” and “Dialogue among Giants: Carlton Watkins and the Rise of Photography in California.”
Art exhibitions have always been a pleasure of mine, but as I can recall, none, except the Hammer Museums exhibit on Japanese prints has captured my interest and imagination like the photographs of Carlton Watkins. It revealed to me truths about my existence, mortality, and beauty.
The beauty and serenity of the Getty Center perfectly complimented the magnificence of Watkins’ photographs of Yosemite, San Francisco, and mining towns during California’s famed gold rush. The magnitude of the architecture, his mammoth plate camera, and the sublime natural landscapes made me feel as tiny and insignificant as the characters portrayed in his photographs. Watkins captured raw, colossal nature. Nature and architecture were his subjects; people just peppered the landscapes as if to prove nature’s grandeur. He positioned people near enough to the lens, so that I was able to make out the expressions on their faces and see the way they held their hands, but far enough away to show their statures tiny and insignificant in view of the landscape. When I looked at these photographs, I felt as if I was looking through the eyes of God at His creation and seeing the infinitude of nature juxtaposed with the finiteness of man.
I caught my own reflection in some of his daguerreotypes. For the last few weeks, I have given up wearing make up and it has been very uncomfortable for me to see my bare eyes, cheeks, and lips. When I saw my faint image on the burned images of California’s great valleys and falls, I noticed that my face looks clean and serene without make-up. I am beginning to get used to seeing myself and I am beginning to recognize the beauty in my natural features. I am also starting to recognize the beauty of others more.
I could not find Carlton Watkins photographs to post here. See Getty exhibit: http://www.getty.edu/art/exhibitions/dialogue_giants/
