Getty Buys an Annibale Carracci Sketch
Annibale, youngest and most radical of the Carracci family, must have been about 22 when he recorded the features of this unknown woman, without prettifying or stereotyping. The ledger writing is visible through much of the image and is incorporated into shadows and eyebrows. (Coincidentally, the Getty bought a Rubens oil sketch, also on ledger paper, two years ago.)
It is often hard to distinguish the work of Annibale Carracci from that of his older brother Agostino and cousin Ludovico. Several Carracci family drawings in the Getty collection have flipped attributions since their purchase. The Getty does not have a painting by Annibale, though this oil drawing exemplifies his revolutionary naturalism, a decade before Caravaggio.
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At the same time, few other museums are adding to their Old Masters collections as quickly as the Getty. The other curatorial areas you mentioned are best served by LACMA. It shouldn’t compete for it. I'd love to see the villa antiquities combined with the Center, but that’s not going to happen. The Getty does induce museum fatigue very quickly though. It needs more scupture.
As for LA's other major art museum, it's now acting in a "who gives a damn?" way about its own not-exactly-mature collections. Downsizing, de-emphasizing, downplaying and scattering. But way more red ink in the process. And a lot more of a museum director's inflated ego and irresponsibility too.
Michael Govan is now doing to LACMA what Barry Munitz was doing to the Getty several years ago.
@Anonymous (10:13PM): LA has always been about serving the ego of the rich and privileged at the expense of lower & middle-class taxpayers. Norton Simon, J. Paul Getty, Armand Hammer and Eli Broad could've easily given their art collections to an existing public institution, but their difficult egos led them to create private museums. As a result, LA's art scene is just as fragmented as the city itself. LACMA was our last great hope for a traditional encyclopedic museum that could be the West Coast's answer to The Met and Art Institute of Chicago, but Govan rather have another bullet-point on his resume.
If anything, when a person like Michael Govan, with the blessing of supposed public overseers (LA County), is going to trash the major taxpayer-supported art museum of Los Angeles, Simon, Hammer and Broad were wise to separate themselves years ago from LACMA.
What a waste. Sickening.