Heide Museum of Modern Art

Heide Museum of Modern Art

Heide I, a former farmhouse and one of the museum's exhibition spaces, idedicated to displays from the Collection and Archive.
Established	1981
Location	Bulleen, Manningham, Melbourne, Australia
Type	Modern & Contemporary art museum, Historic site, Sculpture park
Visitors	70,000
Public transit access	Route 903 SmartBus from Heidelberg Station
Website	www.heide.com.au

Heide Museum of Modern Art, or Heide as it is affectionately known, is a State-owned public museum and gallery museum located in Bulleen, a suburb of Melbourne, Australia. Established in 1981, the museum comprises three distinct exhibition buildings set within sixteen acres of heritage gardens and a sculpture park. Two domestic buildings of historical importance, and an additional purpose-built gallery, are used to exhibit works by twentieth- and twenty-first-century artists. Heide is unique within the context of Melbourne’s cultural sector as it brings together modern and contemporary art, gardens and architecture, as well as a rich social and artistic history.

The museum occupies the site of a former dairy farm that was purchased by the prominent Melbourne art benefactors John and Sunday Reed in 1934 and became the gathering place for a collective known as the Heide Circle, which included many of Australia's best-known modernist painters, including Albert Tucker, Sidney Nolan, Joy Hester, who often stayed in the former farmhouse, now known as Heide I.

Between 1964 and 1967, the Reeds built a new residence, Heide II, which is considered to be one of the finest examples of modernist architecture in Victoria. In 1980, the Reeds sold Heide II, most of the adjoining property and significant works from their art collection to the Victorian State Government after several years of negotiations for the creation of a public art gallery and park. The Heide Collection has since expanded through many individual gifts as well as four significant collections—the Museum of Modern Art and Design Collection, the Baillieu Myer Collection of the 80s, the Barrett Reid Collection, and most recently, the Albert Tucker Gift donated by Barbara Tucker.

in 1993 a new gallery building was added to the Heide complex, designed by Andrew Andersons from Peddle Thorp Architects. When the museum underwent major redevelopment in 2005–06, significant extensions were made to this building by O'Connor + Houle Architecture. Also during this period the Sidney Myer Education Centre was built, Heide II and the surrounding gardens were restored, and new facilities were constructed: the Sir Rupert Hamer Memorial Garden, the Tony and Cathie Hancy Sculpture plaza and the Federation Way Car Park.