Frank Gehry's Guggenheim Abu Dhabi finally has an opening date
Following years of delays and controversies, the building is (almost) ready for its big reveal. Here's what to know
Following 20 years of fits and starts, the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi will open to visitors on 11 December 2026, according to an announcement released today. The museum, designed by late architect Frank Gehry, will join a cluster of starchitect-designed cultural institutions on Saadiyat Island, a 10-square-mile landmass off the coast of Abu Dhabi.
The project, a partnership between the Guggenheim Foundation and Abu Dhabi’s Department of Culture and Tourism, will be a temple to modern and contemporary art from around the world – a collection the museum has been amassing since 2009.
While details about programming and specific artworks have yet to be released, the museum says that it will display works across mediums, including painting, sculpture, film, installation, digital art and more. A 2015 exhibition titled 'Seeing Through Light: Selections from the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi Collection' included works by artists including Yayoi Kusama, Rachid Koraïchi, Robert Irwin, Monir Shahroudy Farmanfarmaian and Douglas Wheeler.
‘The museum’s art collection is uniquely local and global, centered in the region but with works from all continents,’ said Guggenheim Foundation director and CEO Dr. Mariët Westermann in a statement.
Gehry, who died in December 2025, conceived of the building as an assemblage of 10 conical volumes that together create a ‘skyline’ of stainless steel mesh, glass and onyx. The 125,000 sq ft structure will contain 30 galleries which surround a towering central atrium. The museum, according to the Guggenheim Foundation, ‘is designed to impress at every level.’
The Guggenheim Foundation first revealed that it would build a satellite museum on Saadiyat Island in 2006, a project that would join Guggenheim locations in New York, Venice and Bilbao, Spain – a Gehry-designed project so successful that it became a byword for urban revitalisation.
Reaching the project’s finish line, however, wasn’t without hurdles and controversies. Contract changes and economic strain caused the museum, first projected to open in 2013, to be delayed for years. The treatment of migrant labourers on Saadiyat Island construction sites also drew fire from human rights activists and artists, sparking protests and eventually leading Gehry to engage a human rights lawyer to monitor site conditions.
Still, said Westermann, the ‘Guggenheim Abu Dhabi will be a source of wonder, a hub of connection, and a place of curiosity and joy for people from the United Arab Emirates and the world.’
The Guggenheim Abu Dhabi will join multiple museums and cultural sites on Saadiyat island, including the Louvre Abu Dhabi, designed by Jean Nouvel; the Zayed National Museum, designed by Foster + Partners; the Abrahamic Family House, designed by David Adjaye; in addition to the under-construction Dar al Funoon Abu Dhabi, a performing arts centre also designed by Gehry.
