When faced with a difficult decision, what Wood you do?

Susan Wood, professor of art history, would transfer schools and move to the city of her dreams.

Wood earned her master’s and doctorate degrees from Columbia University in New  York, pursuing the busy city in efforts to fulfill her fairytale expectations.

“The main reason I wanted to be there was because it was in New York City and I had romantic ideas of how much fun it was going to be to live in (the city), but I quickly found out it’s only a lot of fun if you’re really rich. It’s not fun if you’re on a student budget,” Wood said.

While working on her dissertation, she spent a year at the American Academy in Rome, which allowed her to access European museums and research facilities. Though the institution didn’t give her a degree, it did give her the title of “Fellow of the Academy.”

“Something I always tell my students is that there is no substitute for seeing the actual objects,” Wood said. “You’ve got to get into museums and look at the real things because you’ll notice details that I can never in a million years show you in a photograph, no matter how good the photographs are.”

In her spare time, Wood likes gardening and bird watching. She says it’s hard to do both at the same time because they are mutually exclusive, and gardening takes up a lot of her time.

This summer, Wood and a few students will be traveling to the small country of San Marino in Italy to learn about art history and conservation. Wood will be teaching a few classes while she is there.

“The (San Marino trip) should be an exciting chance to get back to some places I’ve seen, and to go to places I haven’t seen,” Wood said. “I’m also excited to share it with a group of students.”

This semester, Wood is teaching two classes: Intro to Western Art 1 (AH 100) and Greek Art (AH 312).