Foundations to Future: Abu Dhabi’s cultural vision blossoms

Mohamed Khalifa Al Mubarak, Chairman, Department of Culture and Tourism – Abu Dhabi

ABU DHABI, United Arab Emirates, Nov. 17, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- This month, the United Arab Emirates hosted the 27th General Conference of the International Council of Museums (ICOM) in Dubai. As a milestone moment for our nation and the wider region, the event presented the perfect opportunity to make a distinctively UAE contribution to the global discourse on museology and culture.

The conference theme, “The Future of Museums in Rapidly Changing Communities,” posed urgent questions about the indispensable role museums play as communities confront social, economic, and environmental challenges.

The UAE’s commitment to museums finds its origin in the foresight of our Founding Father, the late Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan. In 1969, even before the nation was formally established, he commissioned the UAE’s first museum in the oasis city of Al Ain. Sheikh Zayed acted on a fundamental and timeless truth, that “a nation without a past is a nation without a present or a future.”

For over five decades, we have built upon that foundational commitment by living our values and weaving cultural infrastructure into the very fabric of our communities. Today, across the UAE, we are working together to ensure that our cultural treasures and heritage remain a living part of our shared future.

In the UAE, our conviction in the essential value and enduring importance of museums remains absolute. We firmly believe that when museums operate with a genuine mandate to serve their communities, they transcend their institutional walls. They become powerful catalysts for opportunity, fostering profound human connection, driving societal transformation, and, crucially, empowerment of the next generation.

We have continued to build an authentic, ambitious and comprehensive museum ecosystem from the ground up because we possess an unwavering belief in the power of these institutions as critical infrastructure for cultural vitality, deep understanding and shared belonging.

Abu Dhabi’s cultural investment
Over the past decade, Abu Dhabi has accelerated its cultural development with purpose and clarity. We have successfully advanced and are on the verge of delivering major national museum projects in Saadiyat Cultural District, including the Zayed National Museum and the Natural History Museum Abu Dhabi, the first of its kind in the region. Guggenheim Abu Dhabi will follow soon, joining the existing Louvre Abu Dhabi, the first universal museum in the Arab world, and teamLab Phenomena Abu Dhabi in the same district. We have also renovated and reopened heritage institutions such as the Al Ain Museum an Qasr Al Hosn. At the same time, we have deepened cooperation with our national partners on safeguarding the UAE’s intangible heritage, advancing the UNESCO list that honours living traditions across all emirates. Through a growing archaeology programme, we continue to uncover remarkable discoveries, from paleontological and fossil sites to early Christian artefacts, that enrich our understanding of the historic and diverse cultures that once flourished on this land. These achievements reflect Abu Dhabi’s long-term commitment to building one of the most active and forward-looking cultural landscapes globally.

As Abu Dhabi advances its own long-term cultural vision, it does so as part of a unified national ecosystem, meshed by a dynamic creative landscape, deep-rooted museum tradition, and the cultural energy of all emirates.

The Abu Dhabi museum model
Museums today are redefining their role as guardians of culture and laboratories of knowledge, creativity and discovery. They are deepening our understanding of humanity’s shared story, from the origins of life on Earth to the creative and cultural forces that shape our future. This vision, already embodied in the institutions of the Saadiyat Cultural District and beyond, demonstrates how museums can serve as living platforms for research, education, and dialogue.

The understanding that museums catalyse communities was also a core principle when we designed Saadiyat Cultural District and formulated the Abu Dhabi Model for a museum ecosystem. Our approach was fundamentally holistic, looking far beyond the architectural exteriors to the essential spaces between them. We deliberately prioritised the civic role of museums as authentic places of encounters and dialogue, genuine connection and social cohesion.

Each institution in the district serves a distinct and highly specialised purpose and together they form a synergistic ecosystem where museums complement one another, fundamentally strengthening our national identity, enriching our civic life, and accelerating our collective progress.

Our museums are also spaces of belonging, where the 200 nationalities that call the UAE home can find common ground and shared human experience. Our museums are powerful platforms for socio-economic opportunity, supporting creative careers, sustaining cultural industries, attracting cultural tourism and inspiring future generations. Our museums help define identity for young people who seek to understand their roots while navigating a rapidly changing world.

Even as we build a museum network up from the grassroots level, they are becoming an integrated and inseparable part of the same dynamic ecosystem as our communities.

Our contribution to global dialogue
For decades, the richness and complexity of Arab culture has been underrepresented in global discourse. Our museums inject these distinct and essential narratives rooted in our histories and cultures directly into the global dialogue, demonstrating that culture here has always flowed through our communities, rooted in values of connection, craftsmanship, poetry, and our deep relationship with the land and the sea.

Through international partnerships like ICOM, we share our expertise, learn from others, and add our clear voice to global conversations of consequence. Hosting ICOM 2025 in the UAE created a shared platform where Gulf and Arab museum professionals engaged with global peers as active and influential partners in shaping the museum practices of tomorrow.

We are building a museum network from the grassroots level up, where museums are not separate from our communities, they are an integrated and inseparable part of the same, dynamic ecosystem. And as we build together, as a nation, as a region, and as a global museum community, with purpose and vision, we build a future worthy of our past.

About the Department of Culture and Tourism – Abu Dhabi:

The Department of Culture and Tourism – Abu Dhabi (DCT Abu Dhabi) drives the sustainable growth of Abu Dhabi’s culture and tourism sectors and its creative industries, fuelling economic progress and helping to achieve Abu Dhabi’s wider global ambitions.

By working in partnership with the organisations that define the emirate’s position as a leading international destination, DCT Abu Dhabi strives to unite the ecosystem around a shared vision of the emirate’s potential, coordinate effort and investment, deliver innovative solutions, and use the best tools, policies and systems to support the culture and tourism industries.

DCT Abu Dhabi’s vision is defined by the emirate’s people, heritage and landscape. We work to enhance Abu Dhabi’s status as a place of authenticity, innovation, and unparalleled experiences, represented by its living traditions of hospitality, pioneering initiatives and creative thought.
For more information about the Department of Culture and Tourism – Abu Dhabi and the destination, please visit: dct.gov.ae and visitabudhabi.ae/

Media Contact: Mina Kiwan on mina.kiwan@ogilvy.com or +971552426806

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