Lucas Jiang ‘26
Anthropologists define space as a physical location and place as the personal and cultural meaning associated with a space. Wendy Wu ‘24, a self-proclaimed “nerdy, observant, and artsy jerk,” hopes to build the bridge in between. Their journey to find meaning in anything and everything stretches from cross country to botany, philosophy to art museums, photography to robotics, and much more.
Wendy appears everywhere on campus. They are a house prefect at Gaccon, a facilitator on the robotics team, the captain of girls’ cross country, and the leader of Students For Sustainability (S4S). Indeed, they have created many cherished memories for those around her at school. For instance, many found their presentation in chapel last year memorable when they called for environmental awareness by using the example of the cherry blossoms at St. Mark’s. Others have thanked their contributions to the robotics team as they led a team of sophomores to build the bumpers and field elements this year.
Behind these seemingly disparate activities is Wendy’s interdisciplinary mind. They comment, “Sometimes, I learn something in English class, and I use it in my math class. It’s unusual, but I don’t think any subject exists by itself.” Moreover, they will be majoring in public health in college, which is an interdisciplinary study encompassing anthropology, medicine, statistics, etc. Each subject means a new perspective on the world for Wendy.
Wendy is also a botany enthusiast. As a child, they visited the South China Botanical Garden almost monthly and gradually learned the names of a great number of plants. To them, plants are more than the inanimate objects we generalize as “a tree” or “that blue flower.” Howie Shi ’26 says that they often apologizes to the plants whenever they pull on a tree branch to smell its flowers or tramples a bush accidentally. They say it is because they feel guilty for imposing pain on trees by climbing them when they were young.
Wendy Wu at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum
Art museums best demonstrate the difference between space and place. Wendy has a unique fondness for art museums, not only for the art. The people, architecture, atmosphere, and arrangement in an exhibition draw Wendy in. They regularly visit the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum to take pictures of the visitors and plants because each time is a new experience. The arrangement of the artwork also speaks to Wendy. They recall, “There was a painting of Mother Mary caressing the foot of baby Jesus, and interestingly, there was also a marble sculpture of a little foot right next to it. Moments like this make me feel as if I am having a conversation with Gardner, who lived a hundred years ago.” They are also the teaching assistant of the Museum Exploration and Curation Lion Term. “I am excited to see how different people and atmospheres can change one’s experience even with the same artwork,” says Wendy.
Cross country, religion, botany, photography, literature, art museums. All of these things are merely a fraction of Wendy’s interests and hobbies as they explore the world. Any space can become a place, and everything has a meaning. In their words, “I would love to turn a space into a place for someone else because that means I matter to that person, to turn that empty, materialistic object into something blooming with memories and emotions and meaning.” We wish Wendy the best of luck in college and in their life ahead.