Success Stories

Nina Willems

Nina Willems studied Neuropsychology at the University of Utrecht and Theatrical Performance at the Toneelacademie Maastricht in 2011. The main focus of her work is “the quest to what shapes our human identity in the broadest sense of the word - whether it’s how your brain works, how the city you live in shapes you, how the clothes you wear tell your story…”

According to Nina, art should always be a starting point for a dialogue with the audience. “I create the work as a way to connect people to the theme of it; I want to encourage them to share their stories about it and to be open to the stories of others”.

“FASHIONCLASH gave me an exciting platform as a starting creator, where I was able to experiment with the cross-over between, theater, film and fashion. (…) I am still very proud of the first edition of my project VERWEVEN, for FASHIONCLASH Festival 2013. It was the first time that I really succeeded in bringing different disciplines (film, fashion, design and performance) and personal stories together.”

Next to creating and producing her own performances, Nina was coaching young theater makers at Via Zuid and iArts at ZUYD University of Applied Sciences. Together with poet Merlijn Huntjens, Nina forms the collective PANDA (Poetry And New Dramatic Arts) in which they combine poetry and theatrical performance. PANDA is located in Heerlen and in 2023 it won the ‘Inspiratieprijs Cultuurfonds Limburg’ (Inspiration Price) from the Limburg Cultural Fond. In addition to this, Nina works as a professor for the Toneelacademie in Maastrichtl.