Louvre Abu Dhabi: Tickets price, Activities, opening hours, exhibits and more

There are few famous museums around the world like The Vatican Museum, The British Museum, The Egyptian Museum, and more. However, the most famous one in my opinion is The Louvre in Paris. Since we were kids, we always listen and read about the great museum of Louvre in Paris and who did not want to visit it at someday. Now adays we have the new Louvre in Abu Dhabi which is a great news for a lot of people in the region and such a fantastic tourism attraction that brought a neat piece of history to UAE and of course helped in increasing the number of tourists by recording 2,000,000 visitors by 2019.

Back in 2007 an agreement was signed between UAE and France. This agreement allows UAE to use the Louvre name until 2037. This signed piece of paper made us witness the greatness of a 260,000 sq ft building along with 86,000 sq ft of galleries built on Saadeyat Island in Abu Dhabi. If we are talking in numbers, then definitely this is the biggest museum in the Arabian Peninsula.

Inspired by the beautiful shape of domes in the old Arabic style of architecture Jean Nouvel decided to design his modern silver dome that weighs 7,500 tons. The dome is designed as mixture of more than 7,800 stars overlapping each other in different angels and sizes, and it allows the light to pass through it and spread in a way called rain of light effect. Also, if you look from far away you would see the dome as if it is floating over the island.

Louvre Abu Dhabi which is designed by the 76 years old Jean Nouvel who has built more than 24 significant buildings, contains a permanent collection of more than 600 pieces of artwork from different cultures and eras divided as following, 300 pieces are owned by the museum and another 300 pieces on loan from French museums which cost nearly 455,000,000 EUR.

New Acquisitions & Loans

The Museum has recently made new acquisition for four new pieces some of them goes back to 300 – 400 BCE and 2800 – 2550 BCE. These pieces are from Egypt and Iraq in addition to two other pieces that goes back to the year 1000 – 1100 related to India and Central Asia.

They also made new loans for few beautiful pieces of art like CARAVANS, GYPSY CAMP NEAR made by the great Van Gogh and other paintings dated back to 1928, 1888, 1840, and 1858 painted by great figures like Claude Monet, Pierre Bonnard, and Edgar Degas.

Activities & Tickets Price

The museum is not into presenting pieces of art and monuments, they also have a lot of activities and workshops and in the next few lines, we will introduce to you some of the provided activities.

–The children’s museum: with a very discounted offer for this month of October, when the ticket costs only 100 AED per family and the activities that are still on and the previous ones are, (Emotions! The New Art Adventure – Animal Between Real and Imaginary – Travelling Shapes and Colors).

–MakeandPlay Activities at The Museum: which are fun activities inspired from the museums artwork and it costs only 50 AED and if you are a student or member of Art club you can get your ticket for 40 AED.

–Paddle like a poltergeist this Halloween: taking place on the 31^st of October for 126 AED, an event created for Kayakers or Kayak lovers to come well dressed for the Halloween and be scary as much as you can.

-Yoga Under the Dome: for 90 AED per session (including access to the galleries and exhibitions), you can rest your mind and reach the inner peace you are seeking.

–Kayaking Around the Museum: if you are a Kayaker, you can pay only 126 AED for a beautiful tour around the museum and learn about its great architecture.

–Kayaking Tours for Juniors: for 126 AED you can a ticket for you and for your child who is aged between 6-12 years old.

-Louvre Abu Dhabi Park: With 63 AED you can have access to the beautiful park of the museum, where you can chill and enjoy the sea. You can even work out or run if you are not there for chilling.

The standard ticket prices for the Louvre starts from 63 AED for adults and 32 AED for youth aged between 13 – 22 years old and same prices apply for seniors above 65 years old, and the same applies for visitors with special needs and their companion.

You can also be a member of the art club for an annual subscription of 472.50 AED and enjoy a lot of discounts and exclusive events for members. Also, you will gain free entry to the partner museums in France.

Beautiful Picks from The Collection

-Amphora Showing Heracles Battling the Nemean Lion Dated Back to 520 BCE

– Astrolabe dated back to 1726 – 1727 owned by Astrolabe

– Pasha and Bedouin: A painting Dated back to 1858 by Roger Fenton

  – Military Helmet: returns to the Greek Archaic Period dated back to 550 BCE

– Dagger With a Parrot-shaped Pommel dated back to the 16^th century

– Coin of Severus Alexander, Roman Emperor dated back to 231 CE-235 CE

– Ewer with a Phoenix Head goes back to the 8^th century

– Winged Dragon dated back to 450 BCE-250 BCE a unique masterpiece goes back to the chinese preimperial period.

– Romanesque Capital dated back to the beginning of the 12^th century

– Image of a Queen or a Goddess dated back to 360 BCE-282 BCE in Egypt.

-A decorated Dish with a European Ship dated back to 1625-1650.

The Boutique

if you are at such fascinating place, then you would not go back home or back to your country without having something special to document your memory in the Louvre. You either would love to buy a souvenir for yourself or your friends as a gesture. They have a boutique that contains a lot of things such as homeware, fine souvenirs and prototypes for the pieces of art from different ages and cultures. In addition to the books and the kid’s area. And if you are not going to the Louvre soon, you still can purchase items from their online Boutique, and it has almost everything that is in the actual one in place. The prices start from 10 AED, and it goes up to more than 1,500 AED.

 Online Access

Talking about the online features in the previous paragraph, make us mention the online activities you can make if you cannot go to the museum yet. For example, the MAKEANDPLAY activity we mentioned previously is available online, you can watch videos with the shapes and types of arts, and you can learn them online either painting objects or recycling art. Which is a nice activity for both children and family.

And if you are into learning something new, Louvre Abu Dhabi offers you stories for some of the pieces on loan available through video and audio materials. And it is called Dragon and Phoenix: Centuries of Exchange between Chinese and Islamic worlds.

In addition to the Webinars available such as Arts for Health and Wellbeing webinar, there is also an application available for your kid’s tablet or your mobile phone with a lot of stories and art history material suitable to people from 4 years old to infinity.

There is a research center that is available for the online usage for the time being, and it offers help to students wants to enquire about any information related to their research subject. And the physical access is not currently available as it is still under development.

 Operating Hours

The Museum operates 6 days a week from 10:00 AM and they close at 18:30 PM Abu Dhabi Local Time. The operating days are from Tuesday until Sunday and the are closed on Monday. And be notified that after 17:30 PM the museum accepts no more visitors.

How to Get there

• If you have a private car and coming from either Abu Dhabi City from the Corniche/Mina port, or from Dubai on E11 or Yas island, take Saadiyat Island / Yas Island exit on to Sheikh Khalifa Highway E12 and drive Along Yas Highway to the cultural District / Louvre Abu Dhabi on Saadiyat Island.
• And if you will take the bus, then you need to ride Public Bus Route 49 and it stops at Louvre Abu Dhabi.