This article was originally published on Getty News & Stories

In the middle of a park in Long Beach, local artist Mufasa was encouraging kids and grown-ups alike to unleash their inner creativity.

Along with fellow artists Mister Toledo and Josh Garcia, Mufasa set up big sheets of white paper, with cups of paint and paintbrushes scattered enticingly around. After a few hours, the paper was filled with colorful depictions of faces, a palm tree, the Queen Mary, and more.

This activity was part of the recent Getty 25 community festival in Long Beach, and it represents what Mufasa hopes is the future of art: an experience that is interactive, open, and welcoming to young people.

Mufasa was one of dozens of aspiring creatives who participated in Getty’s 10 community festivals to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Getty Center as well as LA’s thriving cultural scene. For these practitioners, the future looks alternately bright and uncertain. Despite the accessibility of digital platforms and other technology, young artists still contend with many of the same struggles their predecessors confronted for centuries: getting paid for their work and being recognized by cultural “gatekeepers,” like museums and galleries (a struggle that even masters like Nicolas Poussin, the “Father of French Classicism,” faced).

“Museums need to humble themselves and get immersed into what kids, teens, and young budding artists are doing and find ways to get their voices out there,” Mufasa said, before adding strokes of green and pink to the paper. “There are so many artists with immense talent.”

This article was originally published on The Getty Iris

Every weekday morning, Eliza Reinhardt and her creative partner, Finn, start their day at 7am by getting up, brewing a cup of coffee, and snuggling while they browse online galleries to find a work of art to re-create as part of the Getty Museum Challenge. After choosing a painting, Reinhardt finds the costumes and props they’ll need to bring it to life, sets up the shot in the loft in her apartment that serves as her art studio, and gets Finn dressed in his costume and in place for the photo shoot.

Finn is a three-year-old Australian shepherd, but he follows direction as carefully as an actor on a film set. “I really do think Finn takes this on as his daily task,” Reinhardt said. “I say, ‘Finn, do you want to do a photo? You want to go take a picture?’ And he’s ready to go.”

This article was originally published on The Iris

As COVID-19 closed in on the United Kingdom in mid-March, opera singer and BBC broadcaster Peter Brathwaite was abruptly left with time he didn’t want: all of his upcoming performances were canceled until August. He kept busy practicing and researching for future shows, but was still “twiddling his thumbs a bit.” But then he came across the Getty Museum Challenge—an invitation to recreate a famous work of art using props from around your home; a fellow opera singer had posted a photo on Twitter of herself as Johannes Vermeer’s Girl With a Pearl Earring. Braithwaite thought, what can I recreate?

While browsing for images, he found A Black Servant, England, an 18^th-century painting by an unknown artist. “I’ve got some clothes that are that color,” he thought, “and I could take the photo in my window.” Substituting a stuffed sheep for the dog, he faithfully emulated the rest of the painting, from the draped green curtain to the smile on the subject’s face.