All activities / Museums & Galleries / Nuuk
Museums & Galleries in Nuuk
Greenland's capital and largest town, founded in 1728 on a fjord-cut peninsula on the southwest coast, mixing colonial-era timber houses in the old Kolonihavn quarter with modern harbourfront architecture, and home to the country's main museums and cultural institutions.
Why here
Nuuk holds the two collections that make sense of Greenland, and you can see both in an afternoon between fjord and mountains. At the Greenland National Museum you stand before the Qilakitsoq mummies, four Thule-culture people preserved almost intact since around 1475 AD and returned from Denmark in 1982, alongside kayaks, hunting gear and national dress that trace four and a half thousand years of Inuit life. A short walk away, Nuuk Art Museum sets Greenlandic soapstone carving, painting and tupilak figures against foreign artists' views of the Arctic, in a converted church built around one family's private collection. Together they read the country's story from the Thule migrations to living Kalaallit art, all indoors and open whatever the weather does outside.
Best months
Both museums are indoor and open year-round, which makes this the strongest bad-weather and dark-season option in Greenland. Opening hours are shorter in winter and some days the museums close, so check schedules before visiting. Nuuk's weather swings fast between sun, fog and wind off the fjord, and winter brings long darkness, so an indoor cultural day pairs well with an aurora night.
Getting there & around
Nuuk has Greenland's busiest airport, with direct flights from Copenhagen and Iceland and domestic connections, so it is an easy base. Both museums sit in or near the old colonial harbour quarter, within walking distance of central hotels and of each other. Check current opening hours online, as they vary by season, and allow a couple of hours for each collection.
Skill levels: beginner
Schools & guides (2)
Greenland National Museum
OrganizerThe Greenland National Museum and Archives (Nunatta Katersugaasivia Allagaateqarfialu) sits on Hans Egedesvej in colonial-era Nuuk and was among the first museums founded in Greenland, in the mid-1960s. Its best-known holding is the Qilakitsoq collection, four remarkably preserved Thule-culture mummies from around 1475 AD, repatriated from Denmark in 1982. The galleries also cover Inuit kayaks, national costume, archaeology and the country's written archives.
Nuuk Art Museum
OrganizerNuuk Art Museum (Nuuk Kunstmuseum) opened in 2005 in a former Adventist church on Kissarneqqortuunnguaq, a few minutes from the centre of Nuuk. It grew from the private collection of businessman Svend Junge and his wife Helene, given to the city, and now holds more than a thousand items, including some 250 paintings, watercolours and figures carved in soapstone, bone and ivory. It shows both Greenlandic artists and foreign painters who depicted the Arctic.