Museum Home Past Exhibitions Oudry's Painted Menagerie

May 1–September 2, 2007 at the Getty Center

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All events are free, unless otherwise noted. Seating reservations are required. For reservations and information, please call (310) 440-7300 or use the "Make Reservation" buttons below.

Curator's Gallery Talks

Listen to one-hour talks about the exhibition by Getty Museum curators. No reservation required. Meet under the stairs in the Museum Entrance Hall, Getty Center.

Mary Morton, associate curator, Department of Paintings
Wednesdays, May 23 and June 6, 2007, 3:00 p.m.

Charissa Bremer-David, associate curator, Department of Sculpture and Decorative Arts
Thursday, June 28, 2007, 3:00 p.m.

Christine Giviskos, assistant curator, Department of Drawings
Thursday, July 12, 2007, 3:00 p.m.

Point-of-View Talks

Talks are held at 4:30 and 6:00 p.m. in the Museum galleries at the Getty Center. No reservation required. Sign up at the Museum Information Desk beginning at 3:00 p.m. the day of the program.

Michael Dee, Los Angeles Zoo's general curator, zoo historian, and rhinoceros expert, explores the historic fascination with exotic animals, particularly Clara the rhinoceros.
Friday, June 22, 2007

Academy Award-winning director William Friedkin discusses his recent film project documenting the conservation effort undertaken by the Getty Museum to restore two large-scale paintings presented in the exhibition.
Friday, August 3, 2007

Exhibition Tours

One-hour exhibition overviews led by gallery teachers are offered Tuesdays through Sundays at 3:00 p.m. beginning May 8, 2007. No reservation required.

Family Activities

Los Angeles' Cultural Summer Safari
Journey through the wilds of L.A. beginning May 29 with our free Family Passport, your guide to family adventure at the Getty Center, Skirball Cultural Center, Natural History Museum, and L.A. Zoo.

Learn more and download your passport now.

Family Festival
Medieval beasts and animals of all kinds are the inspiration for this daylong festival featuring fantastic stilted creatures, tales from Aesop's Fables, hands-on workshops, music, and dance. No reservation required.

Sunday, June 3, 2007, 10:00 a.m.–6:00 p.m.
Getty Center, Museum Courtyard

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Family Festival
Explore the impact of animals in cultures around the world. This daylong festival features the Rangoli Dance Company's Song of the Cow from India and a multicultural array of animal tales, dances, costumes, and music with interactive workshops and activities for all ages. No reservation required.

Saturday, August 4, 2007, 10:00 a.m.–6:00 p.m.
Getty Center, Museum Courtyard

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Garden Concerts for Kids
Our popular outdoor music series returns for three wild weekends. Sing along with some of the best children's music artists around, including Justin Roberts, enjoying songs about giraffes, rhinos, camels, dinosaurs, and more! No reservation required.

Saturdays and Sundays, August 11 and 12, 18 and 19, and 25 and 26, 2007, 4:00 and 5:00 p.m.
Getty Center, Central Garden

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Storytelling
Hear Victoria Burnett tell a musical tale about Clara the rhinoceros. No reservation required. Sign up at the Museum Information Desk the day of the program.

Saturdays, May 26–September 1, 2007 (except August 4), 10:30 and 11:30 a.m.
Getty Center, Museum galleries

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Family Art Lab
Join your children in an outdoor, drop-in workshop designed to exercise the imagination. Visit the exhibition and then make your own animal-inspired masterpiece! No reservation required.

Thursdays–Sundays, May 26–July 15, 2007, 11:00 a.m.–3:30 p.m.
Getty Center, Family Room Patio

Gallery Course

Designing the Experience: Oudry's Painted Menagerie
Museum designers Nicole Trudeau and Emily Morishita illuminate the complex, collaborative process of designing all aspects of a large-scale exhibition, from three-dimensional environments to promotional graphics. The course includes a lecture, a tour of the exhibition, and a behind-the-scenes glimpse of the design studio. Course fee $20. Open to 40 participants. Reservation recommended; call (310) 440-7300.

Saturday, May 12, 2007, 10:30 a.m.–1:00 p.m.
Getty Center, Museum galleries

Read a post by Nicole Trudeau and Emily Morishita on our new exhibition blog, Looking at Animals.

Real and Imaginary Animals in Art: From Antiquity to Enlightenment
Join museum educators Kelly Williams and Eidelriz Senga for this three-part gallery course. The course begins with a session at the Getty Villa to examine animals as represented in ancient Greek and Roman art. For the next two sessions, visitors meet at the Getty Center to explore the symbolic meaning of medieval creatures inspired by legend and Oudry's portraits of exotic animals based on life studies. Course fee $40; $30 students. Open to 40 participants. Reservation recommended; call (310) 440-7300.

Part 1:
Friday, July 6, 2007, 3:00–5:00 p.m.
Getty Villa, Office Building

Parts 2 and 3:
Fridays, July 13 and 20, 2007, 3:00–5:00 p.m.
Getty Center, Museum Studios and galleries

 
Crane, Toucan, Crane / Oudry
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Lectures

An Introduction to the Art and Career of Jean-Baptiste Oudry
Colin Bailey, chief curator at the Frick Collection in New York and expert on 18th- and 19th- century French painting, sketches the career of this extraordinary artist.

Sunday, May 6, 2007, 4:00 p.m.
Getty Center, Museum Lecture Hall

Looking at Animals
Peter Singer, animal rights philosopher and professor of bioethics at the Princeton University Center for Human Values, considers what art tells us about animals and what it shows us about our prejudices toward other species. When does art reflect our attitudes, and when does it force us to re-examine them?

Thursday, May 24, 2007, 7:00 p.m.
Getty Center, Harold M. Williams Auditorium

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The Tale of Clara, An Eighteenth-Century Rhinoceros
Charissa Bremer-David, associate curator, Department of Sculpture and Decorative Arts, the J. Paul Getty Museum, explores how the fascination for this living wonder stimulated both intense scientific interest and a frenzy for images, commemorative objects, and memorabilia.

Thursday, June 21, 2007, 7:00 p.m.
Getty Center, Harold M. Williams Auditorium

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Artist-at-Work Demonstrations

Drop by as artist David Luce demonstrates techniques for drawing and painting animals. No reservation required.

Sundays, July 1–September 2, 2007
Drawing animals:
1:00–2:00 p.m.
Painting animals:
2:00–3:00 p.m.
Getty Center, Museum Courtyard

Getty Drawing Hour

Enjoy the tradition of sketching from original works of art during Getty Drawing Hour. Instructor Mike Wiesmeier focuses on the art of drawing animals; all you need to bring are drawing pads and pencils. All experience levels welcome. No reservation required. Sign up at the Museum Information Desk beginning at 6:00 p.m. the day of the program.

Fridays, May 4 and 18 and June 1 and 15, 7:00–9:00 p.m.
Getty Center, Museum galleries

Seminar

A Restoration Tale: The Odyssey of Oudry's Painted Menagerie
Mark Leonard, conservator, Department of Painting Conservation, and Scott Schaefer, curator, Department of Paintings, the J. Paul Getty Museum, tell the story of the five-year project undertaken prior to the opening of the exhibition. The odyssey began with their first glimpse of the two paintings, Rhinoceros and Lion, in Schwerin, Germany, in 2001, and evolved as the two pictures traveled to Los Angeles for an intensive restoration campaign. Their efforts catalyzed the development of the exhibition.

Sunday, July 29, 2007, 4:00 p.m.
Getty Center, Museum Lecture Hall
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Studio Course

Collection Connection: Drawn to Animals
Explore new techniques for drawing animals and learn the basics of animal structure and anatomy with artist Peter Zokosky in this two-part course. The first session includes studio exercises and in-gallery sketching at the Getty Center. The second session meets at the Los Angeles Zoo, where participants examine animal bones in the zoo classroom and practice drawing from live animals. Course fee $45. Open to 25 participants. Reservation recommended; call (310) 440-7300.

Part 1:
Tuesday, July 24, 2007, 1:00–4:00 p.m.
Getty Center, Museum galleries

Part 2:
Tuesday, July 31, 2007, 1:00–4:00 p.m.
L.A. Zoo

This course repeats on Tuesdays, August 14 and 21, 2007.

GettyGuideTM Audio Player

What compelled Oudry to paint life-sized portraits of exotic animals? Why were 18th-century Europeans so enamored with a rhinoceros named Clara? Pick up an audio player to hear curators, a conservator, a historian, and a natural history diorama painter talk about some of the artworks in this exhibition. Available anytime for $5 in the Museum Entrance Hall and the Exhibitions Pavilion.