Meet Our Professors: Wendy Sanders, Theatre Arts
Posted: March 22, 2019 | Author: Kenzie Lundberg | Read Time: 2 minutes
Wendy Sanders found her love for costume design early in her life while completing the requirements for a Girl Scout merit badge. During her junior year in high school, while taking college courses in theatre, she decided to make it her career. Wendy earned both a bachelor’s and a master’s degree in technical theatre and design, then went on to teach.
Before becoming an assistant professor of theatre arts, costume history, and costume design at Southern Utah University, Wendy worked with the Boston Ballet, Boston Lyric Opera, and the American Repertory Theatre. In the eleven years she’s been with SUU, Wendy has been able to work closely with her colleagues and see the results of her work with the students, from thread to stage.
“Every script or original piece I work through, as a costume designer, is a problem to solve. As a collaborative team and/or individual designer, we find that each production may have many possible solutions. However, it is the journey and the struggle to find the best solution that is the most interesting, because EVERY journey is different.”
Wendy currently teaches the following courses at SUU:
- THEA 1223 Make-Up
- THEA 2543 Theatrical Design I
- THEA 3571 Portfolio
- THEA 4900 Methods in Theatre Arts Education
- THEA 4980 Student Teaching
Wendy loves theatre for many reasons, but feels there is something truly special in the art that is created in live performance. Art that lives for a short period of time, for a select community and then it is gone.
“You are transcended to a different ‘world’ and get to be the audience to a character’s story. If you were not present, you do not get to experience it — it is a moment in time, but at the close of a curtain, it is over, struck, and stored away.”
For the students in her classroom and beyond, Wendy likes to remind them that learning is their job.
“Attending college is a wonderful privilege that not all people are afforded. Take this time in your life to soak up every experience, new idea, or information presented — be a sponge to the content, instructors you have, and your peers. Learn from everything and everyone.”
Learn more about the Department of Theatre Arts and Dance.
This article was published more than 3 years ago and might contain outdated information or broken links. As a result, its accuracy cannot be guaranteed.
Tags: Faculty College of Performing and Visual Arts
