ABSTRACT
Before 1974 photographs accumulated by the three existing curatorial departments of the Getty Museum were housed in the Malibu "Ranch House" museum. In 1974 then Curator of Paintings Burton Fredericksen centralized the collections in an undesignated basement room of J. Paul Getty's new Roman villa museum. Over the next few years sui generis cataloging schemes were devised to suit the needs of the Antiquities, Paintings, and French Decorative Arts curatorial departments. Photos were mounted on 11" x 13" boards and cataloging information was typed on address labels that were then affixed to the boards. Catalog cards were typed, duplicated, and filed in cabinet drawers for each of the three subject sections. Access points varied according to section; in the Paintings section card files were maintained for artist, current location, and subject. In 1976 J. Paul Getty died, having never seen his new museum.
