Louvre Abu Dhabi has a new director. The Department of Culture and Tourism – Abu Dhabi announced the appointment of Souraya Noujaim, an art historian and curator whose field is Islamic art history and archaeology. She takes over from Manuel Rabaté, whose departure was made public earlier this year. Noujaim arrives with a long record of senior leadership in the museum world. Most recently she directed the Department of Islamic Arts at the Musée du Louvre in Paris and headed France's Grand Department of Islamic Art Heritage. Her connection to the Abu Dhabi museum stretches back more than a decade: she was its first scientific, curatorial and collections management director from 2018 to 2023, a formative period for the institution. In a statement, Noujaim said the museum occupies a special place in both her professional and personal journey. She described it as a place where cultures meet and where stories from around the world are told through shared human experience, and said she looked forward to working with its teams, partners and communities. She set out her priorities as building on the museum's legacy, deepening its engagement with audiences, expanding and enriching its collection, and finding new ways to keep art and culture accessible, relevant and inspiring for everyone. The appointment puts a scholar-curator with deep knowledge of both the Paris and Abu Dhabi institutions at the top of the Gulf's flagship universal museum. She takes the helm at a moment when the museum keeps defining its role as a meeting point between East and West, and her return marks a homecoming to an institution she helped shape from its earliest years.