This museum,
has always housed some of the most unique and famous art, from antiquity
to present day. Connecting the art world in new ways and bringing it to
Amsterdam for everyone to enjoy. H’ART Museum is a global art museum together with its world-renowned museum partners: The British Museum (London),
Centre Pompidou (Paris), and the Smithsonian American Art Museum (Washington
DC), which brings art, culture and stories together as never before. We want to
inspire people through powerful, relevant, and heartfelt art.
We independently curate via this partnership to
exhibit art collections and shows that span borders, time, and relevant
cultural conversations all for people to experience powerful art that lives on
in their hearts long after they’ve left us.
This is because we firmly believe
that Great Art Sparks Hearts.
Historically the building began as a Diaconie Oude
Vrouwen Huys in 1683, a sanctuary for displaced older city ladies. In 1817
places also were made available for men. Until the 20th Century, the church
hall in the home was the second largest in the city and regularly used for
worship. Winston Churchill even set foot in the building alongside the Amstel
River, renamed the ‘Amstelhof’ in 1953.
A major renovation took place in the
1970s, and it was only in 2007 that the last residents were transferred to a
more appropriate home. Ernst Veen, at the time director of De Nieuwe Kerk
Amsterdam, came up with the idea of giving the Amstelhof a new purpose, that of
a museum. Loans from the treasury of the St Petersburg Hermitage, a museum in
Russia, made it possible to open as the Hermitage Amsterdam in a grand opening
in 2009.
More than 5
million visitors have walked through our doors, visiting 30 varied and
inspirational exhibitions. We always welcome a mixture of both international
and local visitors.
Partners and partnerships
- Our founding partner is the VriendenLoterij.
- We sometimes have other museum partners, Dutch and international, varying with the exhibitions we are displaying.
- We have funding and development partners that sponsor and help us with either financial means or expertise, current funding partners are ABN AMRO, Heineken and ELJA Foundation.
- From Summer 2024 we will begin to partner for exhibitions with our new world-famous museum collective, remaining independent.
Artistic development and H’ART Museum Education
We take talent development of young artists very seriously, with what was Hermitage for Children, and is now known as H’ART Museum Education and Talent. We continuously offer art education through which every child can discover their artistic talent in new ways, sparking their hearts too.