What Research, Conservation, and Funding Resources Does Getty Provide?

Getty runs and supports research and conservation of visual art and cultural heritage in Los Angeles and worldwide, and it publishes the tools, collections, and funding routes that work produces. On getty.edu you can reach art and research collections spanning ancient to modern times, research databases, software and APIs, K–12 teaching resources, internships and grants, and cross-institution projects such as Connecting Art Histories. These resources are aimed at researchers, conservators, educators, students, and institutions rather than at general museum visitors alone.

Research and conservation work

Getty describes its role as conducting and supporting research and conservation of visual art and cultural heritage, both in Los Angeles and throughout the world. Two things follow from that for someone using the site:

• Research output is presented as public-facing work, not only internal scholarship. The site's news and stories section, for example, publishes curatorial and technical explanations of individual objects, such as a piece revealing the secrets of a 16th-century painting.
• Conservation is treated as a subject you can read about and study, with projects and initiatives listed under the site's work section.

If your question is "who does this kind of work and can I see it," the Projects & Initiatives area is the place to start. If your question is "can I use their methods or data," go to the resources section instead.

Collections, databases, software, and APIs

The resources section is organized around tools and support for work and study in visual art and cultural heritage. The categories named on the site are:

The distinction that matters in practice: collections and databases are for reading and searching, while software and APIs are for building. If you want to query or integrate Getty data into your own project, the API route is the relevant one; if you want to look at objects and archival material, use the collections.

Funding and early-career opportunities

Getty lists internships and grants as a single resource category, and separately invites visitors to "find funding" from its research and conservation pages. That pairing suggests the funding is tied to the research and conservation mission rather than being general-purpose. The site does not state amounts, eligibility rules, or deadlines in the material available here, so treat any specific figure as something to confirm on the grants page itself before planning around it.

For institutions rather than individuals, Connecting Art Histories is the named example: it is described as increasing intellectual exchange among scholars around the world who study the visual arts.

How to choose where to start

• You are a researcher or conservator seeking support → start with internships and grants, then check Connecting Art Histories if your work is international and scholarly.
• You are a developer or data user → go to software and APIs.
• You are a teacher → go to K–12 teaching resources.
• You want to understand a specific artwork or method → the news and stories section, which publishes object-level explanations.
• You want to visit in person → this is a different task; the two museum sites are the Getty Center and the Getty Villa Museum, and the site presents them as places to enjoy art, architecture, and gardens.

One practical note: the site mixes visitor content (exhibitions, museum locations, shop) with professional resources on the same navigation. If you land on an exhibition page such as Reggie Burrows Hodges: A Theater of Passions, use the "What We Do" and "Resources" links to move into the research side rather than browsing the visit-oriented pages.