When Peter Kjaergaard, director of the Natural History Museum Abu Dhabi, speaks about the institution, he often returns to the idea that science begins not with explanation, but with feeling.
“We want natural history museums to create moments where you pause,” he says. “You have an emotional experience.”
That idea shaped a conversation with Kjaergaard and Lori Bettison-Varga, president and director of the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County, as they spoke to The National while moving through the Abu Dhabi museum’s galleries. The spaces themselves became reference points in a wider discussion about the role natural history museums can play as public institutions, not only in preserving knowledge, but in shaping how people relate to the natural world.
It is an approach that underpins the Abu Dhabi museum’s identity as it establishes itself in Saadiyat Cultural District. While its narrative stretches across 13.8 billion years, from the origins of the universe to the future of life on Earth, the institution resists abstraction. The aim, Kjaergaard suggests, is to invite curiosity.
That philosophy is shared by Bettison-Varga. Both leaders speak with the confidence of long experience, but also with a visible enthusiasm for what natural history museums can become when accessibility is treated as a foundation rather than an afterthought.
“For us, it’s been so important that we are removing as many barriers as possible,” Kjaergaard says. “So that you don’t think you need to be clever to get in. This is a place to engage.”
That intention is reflected in the museum’s design, which encourages movement, curiosity and conversation, rather than passive observation. It also aligns with the wider ambitions of Saadiyat Cultural District, where institutions are conceived as civic spaces intended for repeated visits.
Bettison-Varga frames the role of such museums in similarly public terms. “It’s not just about the past and the dinosaurs,” she says. It is also about “where we are today” and how people understand their place in the world.
For Kjaergaard, that understanding is inseparable from the UAE’s environmental history. He frequently links global narratives to local experience, describing survival in the region as a tradition shaped by conservation and restraint.
That philosophy is made explicit in the building itself. Etched onto one of the museum’s walls is a quote by UAE Founding Father, the late Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, which Kjaergaard describes as foundational rather than symbolic. “On land and in the sea, our forefathers lived and survived in this environment,” the quote reads. “They were able to do so because they recognised the need to conserve it, to take from it only what they needed to live, and to preserve it for succeeding generations.”
For Kjaergaard, the words explain why the museum frames environmental responsibility as a value rooted in the country’s history.
A museum that insists on the local
Despite the vast timescales it covers, the museum repeatedly draws attention back to what is close by. Kjaergaard emphasises that much of the natural world explored inside the galleries exists just beyond the city.
“These big animals, these big whales, they are swimming around here,” he says. “I don’t think people realise these animals are just out there, next door.”
That perspective shapes how the museum approaches mangroves and coastal ecosystems, environments many residents pass daily without engaging with directly. Rather than presenting them as scenery, the galleries position them as living systems shaped by human activity.
“Why do you have a broken whale here?” Kjaergaard asks, referring to a Bryde’s whale that stranded on Jubail Island and is displayed as it was found. “This is actually from the island just next door.”
By anchoring global themes in local examples, the museum aims to foster connection and responsibility. “It’s here with us,” he says. “It’s about celebrating our own place and creating pride in it.”
Bettison-Varga, whose Los Angeles institution dates back more than a century, sees clarity in the Abu Dhabi museum’s approach. “There’s a benefit to opening a new museum because the possibilities are endless,” she says. “You have the opportunity to set the frame for how you want to be part of the community.”
The Natural History Museums of Los Angeles County oversees one of the world’s largest scientific collections, with more than 35 million specimens. Visitors are famously welcomed by the “duelling dinos” in the museum’s central hall. Abu Dhabi uses spectacle in a similar way, but both leaders stress that these moments are designed to open a conversation, not conclude it.
“We’re more than just dinosaurs,” Bettison-Varga says. For Kjaergaard, awe is the invitation. Participation is the goal.
The City Nature Challenge comes to Abu Dhabi
That outward-looking philosophy is reflected in the City Nature Challenge, a global initiative that invites residents to document urban biodiversity using the iNaturalist app.
“You can take pictures of things that you see and upload them into the system,” Bettison-Varga explains. Observations are then identified by community members and specialists, with the strongest entries becoming research-grade data.
The value lies in scale. A small number of museum scientists cannot capture the complexity of life across an entire city, but thousands of residents can. “Scientists alone cannot do those observations,” she says, noting that public participation allows museums to understand what is happening in real time.
The City Nature Challenge began in 2016 as a friendly competition between Los Angeles and San Francisco and now spans hundreds of cities worldwide. Abu Dhabi will take part this April, with the observation window opening in the final week of the month.
For Kjaergaard, the initiative reflects the museum’s desire to extend its reach beyond its galleries. “People are contributing to real data,” he says. “If you’re participating, you feel that you’re part of it.”
He also frames the project as a way of making environmental change visible. “The world is still changing,” he says. “We need to monitor this. We need to keep an eye on what is actually happening.”
Bettison-Varga offers a practical example from her own institution. With only one herpetologist on staff, public observations are essential for tracking changes in species distribution and the spread of invasive animals. “That crowdsourcing is important,” she says, “because it helps reveal patterns we wouldn’t otherwise see.”
Collaboration and the case for awe
What emerges from the discussion is not only a shared philosophy, but a sense of alignment about the future. Both leaders speak openly about collaboration between their institutions, seeing it as a way to strengthen public engagement and expand the role natural history museums play in their cities.
“It’s one big family,” Kjaergaard says, describing a global network that shares research, collections, exhibitions and approaches to community engagement. The relationship between Abu Dhabi and Los Angeles, he suggests, has the potential to elevate both institutions.
Bettison-Varga agrees. Coming from an institution with more than a century of history, she sees value in the perspective a new museum brings. Abu Dhabi’s ability to design its spaces, programmes and partnerships from the ground up, she suggests, offers lessons for older institutions adapting to change.
At the centre of that exchange is a belief in awe as a catalyst for care. Bettison-Varga describes it as critical to drawing people into the story, while Kjaergaard sees it as the first step towards responsibility.
If visitors leave the museum noticing more than they did before, insects, birds, plants and subtle shifts in the landscape, then the institution has succeeded. Nature, Kjaergaard suggests, is present, persistent and waiting for attention.
