The Getty Villa

Outer Courtyard, Getty Villa

We’re staying at the Walnut RV Park in Northridge to be close to sights on the west end of Los Angeles. While the park is in a central location, it has minimal space, no grass, and is 90% permanent RVers. Our first outing was to head down to Venice Beach just to see the activities that we always see in the movies. Sure enough, there were joggers, bikers, volleyball games, surfers, and people just playing in the surf. In the distance was the Santa Monica pier with its small amusement park.

            Our major attraction for the day is the Getty Villa. J. Paul Getty built a Roman villa, based on a Roman house partially excavated in Herculaneum, buried by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in A.D. 79. This house tries to stay true to what a Roman villa would be like in its day. It has an imposing atrium for an entrance, a garden in the center with small rooms surrounding it and a large rectangular private garden to one side. In Rome, people really were discouraged from showing off their wealth, but when they built a villa in the country, the private areas of the residence were the exception. For example, the dining room here which looks upon the private garden has marble floors and panels. Whereas most of the house would just be painted with simple murals. J.Paul Getty used this building to share his art collection with the public. Today, there is both a Getty center and a villa. The villa is dedicated to Greek, Etruscan, and Roman art. The entire museum is free – including tours of the gardens and architecture as well as audio tours. You just pay for parking, and it does require a reservation.

            We always enjoy antiquities and the audio tour really added a lot beyond just viewing statues. For example, one room was dedicated to heroes and we saw examples from each culture depicting Hercules performing his feats from a noble statue where he is holding a lion skin, to pottery showing the tasks he performed. You also appreciate the details that these artists could render: they understood how the muscles of the body would develop based on the sport an athlete would perform, or they would capture the various hairstyles of people, as well as the folds of their clothes. Several chambers also had elaborate mosaic tiles on the floor in intricate geometric patterns. We spent a little over 3 hours here before we finally wore out.

Hercules with lion skin

We took a scenic path home. First, we headed west along the Pacific Coast highway past Malibu. Then we headed north and east into the hills through the scenic canyons. Many of these canyons have provided the scenery for Hollywood westerns or TV series like Mash. Eventually, we found our way to the freeway and our trailer.