Dr. Valerie Hillings Appointed Inaugural Director of Guggenheim Abu Dhabi
The Facts
On August 4, 2026, the Department of Culture and Tourism – Abu Dhabi announced the appointment of Dr. Valerie Hillings as the inaugural Director of Guggenheim Abu Dhabi, a cornerstone of the Saadiyat Cultural District. Dr. Hillings previously served as the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation’s Curator and Associate Director of Curatorial Affairs for the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi Project from 2009 to 2018, where she worked on collection strategy, acquisitions, and pre-opening programming. Most recently, she was Director of the North Carolina Museum of Art, where she oversaw a doubling of annual attendance to 1.2 million visitors and added some 400 works to the collection. She holds a PhD from the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University, and specializes in modern and contemporary art. The museum, designed by Frank Gehry, will feature 30 galleries across 11,600 square meters of interior exhibition space and 23,000 square meters of outdoor areas, focusing on art from the 1960s to the present.
The Signal
The appointment of Dr. Hillings signals a major step forward for Guggenheim Abu Dhabi, which is set to become one of the world’s largest platforms for modern and contemporary art. Her deep familiarity with the project—having shaped its collection and programming from the outset—positions her to lead the museum’s opening and establish its identity as a transcultural institution rooted in Abu Dhabi. For collectors and curators, this appointment underscores Abu Dhabi’s sustained investment in building a world-class cultural destination, with the museum poised to offer a unique lens on global art history through its emphasis on interconnection and exchange across geographies and time periods.
- People: Dr. Valerie Hillings
- Museums: Guggenheim Abu Dhabi, North Carolina Museum of Art, Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, Louvre Abu Dhabi, Zayed National Museum, Natural History Museum Abu Dhabi, teamLab Phenomena Abu Dhabi
- Locations: Abu Dhabi
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