The J. Paul Getty Museum has honored Weston Naef, the outgoing senior curator of photographs, with the title of Curator Emeritus, following his retirement from the museum in January 2009.

Naef came to the J. Paul Getty Museum in 1984 from the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York in conjunction with the acquisition of several private collections that formed the basis for the Getty's photography department. Over the next 25 years, he oversaw the growth of the collection from about 25,000 items to more than 100,000, including works by Alfred Stieglitz, Paul Strand, Irving Penn and Andre Kertesz.

Under his leadership, nearly 100 photographic exhibitions were developed both at the Getty Villa and at the Getty Center. In 2006, Naef presided over the opening of the Getty Center's 7,000-square-foot Center for Photographs, which tripled the facility's exhibition space for photographs.

Naef, the creator and general editor of the "In Focus" book series, which looks at the careers of individual artists in the Getty's collection, has also authored several books on photographers, including Alfred Stieglitz and Georgia O'Keeffe.

He is said to be nearing completion of another project about Carleton Watkins, slated to be published by the Getty in the spring of 2010.

Educated at Claremont Men's College, Ohio State University and Brown University, Naef became drawn to photography while studying 19th-century painting, prints and architecture. Before coming to the Getty, he worked at the Boston Public Library and at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Judith Keller, curator of photographs, will act as interim head of the department while Getty searches for a new senior curator.