Nathalie Bondil
Director of the Museum and Exhibitions at the Arab World Institute in Paris
Franco-Canadian museologist and international art historian, Nathalie Bondil has served as Director of the Museum and Exhibitions at the Arab World Institute (Institut du monde arabe) in Paris since 2021. In this role, she is leading the transformation of the Institute’s museum, whose collections have been significantly enriched with modern and contemporary Arab art through the Claude and France Lemand Collection. Supported by the French Ministry of Culture, this ambitious project seeks to enhance the international recognition of Arab arts while fostering dialogue across cultures and artistic traditions.
From 2007 to 2020, Nathalie Bondil served as Director General and Chief Curator of the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, where she oversaw major expansion projects and curated numerous intercultural and interdisciplinary exhibitions spanning cinema, music, nineteenth-century art, and multiple modernities. A pioneer in museum education and health research, she championed a more inclusive vision of museums through initiatives such as the Michal and Renata Hornstein Pavilion for Peace, the world's first museum-based medical prescription program, and the Wing for the Arts of One World.
Alongside her museum leadership, she teaches museotherapy—at the intersection of museology and health research—as a distinguished mentor and lecturer for the Université de Montréal, the École du Louvre, and the Institut national du patrimoine in Paris. She served as Vice-Chair of the Canada Council for the Arts from 2014 to 2021 and is an elected member of the Board of ICOM France, as well as a member of the Scientific and Cultural Committee responsible for the development of France's future Museum-Memorial of Terrorism. Her outstanding contributions to the fields of museology, culture, and the arts have been recognized through numerous awards and honorary doctorates in both Canada and France.
