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ANN GETTY INSTITUTE OF ART AND DESIGN
About Ann Getty
Farmgirl, preschool founder, fine arts patron, publisher, interior designer, anthropologist, socialite: Ann Getty was a living embodiment of a liberal arts degree. To honor her lifelong passion for learning and devoted support of arts education, her family funded the Ann Getty Institute for Arts and Design.
Born in 1941 in California’s Central Valley, Getty grew up on a peach and walnut farm. After graduating from high school, she moved to the Bay Area and attended UC Berkeley, majoring in anthropology and biology while she worked at the I. Magnin department store in Union Square. It was through that job that she met her future husband, Gordon Getty ’56.
Thanks to Gordon’s status as heir to the Getty Oil fortune, their marriage propelled Ann to the social stratosphere. Determined to have an impact beyond that of a stereotypical socialite, however, Ann devoted herself to supporting and bolstering art of all kinds. She was a fellow of the Leakey Foundation, a board member of the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the New York Public Library, a patron of the San Francisco Symphony, the San Francisco Opera, and the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, and president and publisher of Grove Press.
Ann’s travels and love of beauty of all kinds resulted in an eclectic collection of art, furniture, and artifacts, the auction of which funded the creation of the Ann Getty Institute for Art and Design.