Chala Itai Westerman. Photo by Jimena Gabriella Gauna Chala Itai Westerman
Chala Itai Westerman (1993) is currently Assistant Curator at the Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven.
Her Japanese-Dutch cultural background shapes her research interest in socio-cultural identity. She studied Information Science and Art History at the University of Amsterdam, before completing an MA in Contemporary Art History from the Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam.
During her research and production internship with De Appel in the summer of 2020 she investigated to what extent De Appel’s international reputation connects with diverse Dutch-speaking cultures. Her MA thesis focused on the agency and construction of online identities and called for rethinking the concept of an authentic and inclusive narrative. In 2022, she was a participant of De Appel’s Curatorial Programme.
In 2023 she was part of the curatorial team of the Overhauled Stories, an open studio project by artist Sung Hwan Kim, hosted by Framer Framed in collaboration with the Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven. Sung Hwan Kim reconfigured previous works to create new installations, mending and re-inhabiting video, music and storytelling in order to offer us allegories for everyday life.
Exhibitions
