New director at Stedelijk Museum Schiedam

Anne de Haij will become director of the Stedelijk Museum Schiedam on 1st February 2021. She currently works at the Kunstmuseum in The Hague as a strategic advisor to the management.

In that place she focuses strongly on themes such as inclusion and diversity. As project and program leader, she was responsible for the Mondrian year and the project Glans and happiness. Art from the World of Islam. De Haij will continue the current course of the Stedelijk Museum Schiedam, she says. ‘I think the museum’s modern, smart and down-to-earth approach is great and I am looking forward to taking further steps in that direction in the coming years.’ director who can further develop the Stedelijk Museum Schiedam in terms of both social and artistic content.’Anne de Haij (1983) has worked at the Kunstmuseum for more than 6 years. She says that after years in a large museum she looks forward to working in a smaller organization.

“The Stedelijk Museum Schiedam is a place where the director not only manages, but also sweeps the square for an event or pastes the last captions for an opening.” She likes to talk to people of Schiedam. “ You are not on paper from, for and through the city, you go into the neighborhood for that, you talk to residents and you work together with entrepreneurs. ” In The Hague, she made a major contribution to social policy, with the best-known pillar the program City to the Museum. De Haij: “That resembles My Schiedam, where the museum collaborates with residents. The starting point is that everyone feels at home in the museum.”

Since 2017, she has been committed to a more inclusive and diverse Kunstmuseum. That policy was awarded an important national diversity award from the business world at the beginning of October. She put the subject on the agenda in all kinds of places and asked colleagues what they could do. The result can be seen throughout the organization: in the staff, exhibitions, education and city programs. “I’m mainly a driver here,” she says. “Ultimately, you do it together with colleagues. But by asking the right questions, we have hired other employees, we work with new photographers and filmmakers, and curators tell new stories, such as a recent presentation about the black model in Breitner’s paintings or an exhibition about female fashion designers.”  

De Haij is already hatching ideas for historical exhibitions, modern and contemporary art exhibitions. The latter is in line with the new art program line, for which the Stedelijk Museum Schiedam will receive government funding from 2021. It concerns a new generation of artists operating at the intersection of photography, design, illustration and new media. These artists address themes such as intersectionality, modern feminism and social inequality. Experience Anne de Haij studied art history and art and cultural sciences. She was previously affiliated with the Erasmus University and Utrecht School of the Arts as assistant professor of art philosophy and cultural history. She has also worked at Korzo Productions and CaDance Festival, TU Delft, Creative Industries Fund NL and the Rotterdam Council for Art and Culture.