High Museum of Art, Atlanta

The first curators were hired in 1980, and construction began the following year on a white postmodern building designed by the architect Richard Meier.

The building opened in 1983.  Its four-story atrium, surrounded by a spiraling ramp and capped by skylights, was inspired by Frank Lloyd Wright's modernist design of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York City.

 Key features of Meier's design include such strong architectural elements as the soaring atrium; an emphasis on modernist planes, curves, and lines; and galleries within galleries. The sculptural quality of the High's interior is enhanced by the play of light and shadow reenacted daily in the atrium.

In 1984 the American Institute of Architects (AIA) gave it the Honor Award, architecture's highest recognition for excellence in design. In 1991 the AIA cited the museum building as "one of the ten best works of American architecture of the 1980s," In 2005 it was honored in a U.S. Postal Service stamp series, "Masterworks of Modern Architecture."

A $124 million expansion to the High added three new buildings in 2005, more than doubling the gallery space to 93,800 square feet and allowing for larger-scale installations. The striking contemporary buildings, designed by Renzo Piano, melded with the Meier structure and the Memorial Arts Center, forming what Piano called a "village for the arts." A European-style piazza fosters a sense of enclosure and gives midtown Atlanta a much-needed public space. The expansion also provides room for additional educational programming, a restaurant, and administrative offices.