Click the link to view the full version: Five Future UAL Students, Five Artistic Journeys
Where does an artist’s journey begin?
Perhaps with a paintbrush, a camera, a comic book or a wall covered in spontaneous graffiti……This year, five WASCZ graduates followed their passion for the arts and earned places at one of the world’s leading arts institutions — University of the Arts London (UAL).
Having spent more than five years at WASCZ, they each began their journey from a different starting point. Yet here, they gradually transformed their passion into a clear direction for the future. Perhaps one day, they will become a director creating films that make audiences laugh and cry; a leading graphic designer whose work adorns the walls of skyscrapers; a street artist travelling the world; or the founder of an exciting new fashion label turning heads at Fashion Week…
Through five stories, we trace the authentic artistic journeys and growth of these young people at WASCZ.
01/
She can create striking artwork with a pencil, charge across the rugby pitch, and, when she picks up a camera, direct a short film with a distinctive Stephen Chow-style sense of the absurd. If there were one sentence to sum up Megan, it might be this.
During her six years at WASCZ, Megan seemed to possess an endless supply of energy for trying the things others might ask: “Why not?” The first activity she joined after arriving at WASCZ was rugby. At the time, the school had only a boys’ team. ” Why should the girls have to go it alone?” she wondered. So she acted on the idea, quickly bringing together a girls’ rugby team of around eleven players and inviting a PE teacher to coach them. Their regular training soon got underway in full swing. “Although we weren’t exactly technically brilliant,” Megan jokes, her team still played with plenty of passion in their regular friendly matches. “A strong body and genuine friendships” were the most valuable things she took away from the experience.
Her passion also carries a touch of romance. The work Megan is most proud of is her painting of Don Quixote, inspired by the famous novel. In her interpretation, the distinctly romantic figure appears tall and powerful. Megan says she sees something of herself in Don Quixote: “He has the courage to set off without hesitation and the determination to defend what he believes is right. I want to express that, whatever the future holds, I too have the courage to move forward without looking back.”
The girl who charges fearlessly across the rugby pitch and paints with bold spontaneity also knows how to tell her own story through a camera. At the 2026 WASCZ Culture Festival, Megan won the overall championship with a short film that she wrote, directed and filmed herself, using humour to portray her emotional journey after an unsuccessful exam result. “This is what I am most proud of from my time at WASCZ!” Megan tells us excitedly.
Last summer, she also joined the cast of a short drama as an extra. Although she had only two lines, she was thrilled. “My dream is to make a real film. This was my first step towards being on a film set, and it gave me the chance to see what the real film and television industry is like.”
Her Art teacher, Mr Dowson, once told her that the most important things in studying art are to maintain “passion and purity”. Megan has put both principles into practice.”I hope that, in the not-too-distant future, I can make a film that truly moves audiences,” she says with determination.
Megan spent a day on campus emulating her favourite artist, Vincent van Gogh, and earned the amusing nickname “Sister Van Gogh”.
Before graduating, Megan filmed a video about WASCZ, paying tribute to a memorable exchange from The Last Emperor :
“How can we say goodbye?”
“As we said hello.”
Driven by passion, Megan’s vibrant energy points towards a future that will be just as bold, wholehearted and full of life. Perhaps one day, when we see her name on the big screen, we will think back to this graduation season — and remember her smiling as she said: “As we said hello.”
02/
Kindness and gratitude are recurring themes in Max’s work. Behind his delicate artistic expression lies a deeply personal world, where each creation becomes a reflection on his own experiences.
When it comes to art, Max describes his thinking as “very jumpy”. When inspiration strikes, he can complete an entire piece in one sitting, often forgetting to record the steps in between. Yet for applications to leading art schools overseas, the creative process and the logic behind a portfolio are almost as important as the final pieces themselves.
Mr Hu, one of WASCZ’s Art teachers, quickly recognised this challenge. Through patient guidance, he helped Max turn his bursts of inspiration into a clear and structured record of his creative process. “Mr Hu has been teaching me since IGCSE, so he noticed many of my little habits when I was still younger. He understands the way I think and knows how to guide me effectively,” Max says. “That is one of the advantages of having such supportive teachers, alongside the way the Art curriculum is structured. It allows me to focus on developing my own area of interest.”
Max also shared a deeply moving experience from his childhood. From the age of three, he regularly attended rehabilitation sessions at a rehabilitation hospital. Over the years, he met many children there who, like him, needed support. Those experiences stayed with him. Years later, when he was able to create a portfolio of his own, Max returned to the rehabilitation centre and designed a series of posters to encourage the children there.
“I wanted to help them in whatever way I could, to help more people see and understand this group of children, so that they could receive more support and understanding,” Max says. He also shared his own story of growing up with the children. Having once experienced the kindness of others himself, Max now seeks to pass that kindness on to others who need care and support.
“My creative themes all come from my own feelings and experiences,” Max says. Throughout his journey, gratitude has remained a constant. “I’ve been at WASCZ for about six years. When I first arrived, I wasn’t very confident and I wasn’t very good at expressing myself,” he recalls. “Here, I took part in many sports activities with my classmates. Gradually, I learned how to communicate with others, and I became more confident.”
“I was part of the basketball team for two seasons,” Max says. As a member of the school team, he once travelled to Haikou to compete, where the team achieved an impressive second-place finish. “Although I didn’t have a particularly important role, everyone supported me like family. I felt that I was needed and accepted.” His voice became slightly emotional. “That is how WASCZ feels to me. And the House system makes it feel like a family. It gives us warmth, and we look after one another.”
Art has been Max’s dream since childhood. He admires the delicate and distinctive artistic expression of British artist Lucian Freud, and hopes to continue exploring his own creative direction. “Through graphic design, I hope to express my ideas in a more tangible and direct way,” Max says. We look forward to seeing him continue to use his work to record his authentic experiences, respond to the kindness he has received, and capture the warmth of a world that remains worth cherishing.
03/
“I’ve been drawing for more than ten years, and I enjoy expressing my thoughts through art,” Zac says. Over the years, his work has been selected for publication in several well-known art magazines, and last year he won a Silver Award in the Monet International Painting Competition. It all began with the drawings he made on the walls as a child, when his family first recognised his interest and talent.
At WASCZ, expert teachers gave Zac the confidence to pursue art seriously, while the school’s open and inclusive environment broadened his artistic perspective. He admires the way German artist Anselm Kiefer uses a wide range of materials to create texture on canvas, and has also explored the style of British street artist Banksy, creating a large-scale environmental artwork on the third floor of the Performing Arts Centre.
Over the years, Zac says he has learned two words: respect and equality. Art requires respect for those who teach us, but at WASCZ, teachers are also approachable and treat students as equals. The teacher he most wants to thank is his English teacher during IGCSE. “I wasn’t very confident at the time, and my English wasn’t very strong. She often noticed me in class and gave me a lot of encouragement.” For Zac, that care was like a light, illuminating the path ahead.
During his seven years at WASCZ, Zac never confined himself to the Art Room. In Grade 10, he travelled to Hangzhou as a member of the school football team, competing alongside his teammates. One of his most memorable experiences, however, was taking part in a Duke of Edinburgh’s International Award expedition. “It improved our teamwork and strengthened our resilience,” he says. Carrying equipment through mountain paths and streams, he may well have been thinking that the journey into art is much the same: one step at a time.
Looking ahead, Zac dreams of travelling to different countries, experiencing local cultures and celebrating traditional festivals alongside local people. “These experiences can give me more inspiration for my work,” he says. More than a decade of drawing has given Zac the confidence to create. The open-minded perspective he developed at WASCZ will take him further still, with the belief that the world is vast—and worth exploring, one drawing at a time.
04/
“I’ve dreamed of going to UAL since I was little.” Zoa says this with unwavering certainty. Rather than focusing solely on drawing and design, she is fascinated by how the fashion industry operates—and how creative ideas can be transformed into reality.
When creating, Zoa is never satisfied with simply completing a single piece. She prefers to start with an idea and gradually build an entire world around it. The project she is most proud of is a magazine inspired by “otherworldly realms” and “cyberpunk”. I researched a wide range of renowned artistic materials and styles and incorporated them into the magazine,” she explains. She also created a fictional collaboration between artists she admires and fashion brands she loves, building a complete universe for her imagined fashion world.
In another independent curatorial project, Zoa managed the entire creative process, from designing the exhibition’s visual style and spatial flow to delivering the final presentation. The experience gradually taught her that how a work is viewed is itself part of the creative process.
From designing magazines to curating exhibitions, Zoa gradually found her direction in Fashion Management during her seven years at WASCZ. The quality that enables her to turn bold ideas into reality with remarkable determination is the very keyword she identifies with her growth: Discipline.
At WASCZ, she has had plenty of time to explore her interests. “I plan my time carefully and make full use of my free time to revise different subjects,” she says. Her Economics teachers, Mr Fosu and Ms Ge, also provided invaluable support as she explored the economic forces closely connected to the fashion industry. For Zoa, true self-discipline means finding her own rhythm and steadily turning plans into reality.
Her next goal is clear: “To launch my own brand.” She understands that inspiration may be what sets an idea in motion, but it is sustained action and self-discipline that ultimately bring it to life. As she prepares to head to London, a global centre of fashion and creativity, we believe a much bigger stage awaits her.
05/
As a child, Yuanny would sit in front of the television watching anime and reading manga. The fast-moving images, vivid characters and imaginative stories planted a seed in her mind. She became curious about how these worlds were created and imagined one day being part of that process. That curiosity gradually led her towards the world of art.
At WASCZ, she found more opportunities to explore her creativity. A ceramic cup she made during a pottery lesson is still used at home today. During a school study trip to Germany and Austria, she visited museums and art exhibitions, encountered artistic creations shaped by different cultural backgrounds and saw works by her favourite artist, Monet, in person. The experience, she says, was “truly breathtaking”.
Immersed in this artistic environment, Yuanny learned to turn fragments of everyday life into creative inspiration. While working on her portfolio, she happened to be trying to lose weight. An idea suddenly struck her: she turned the experience into a creative project—a website about weight loss. Using graphic design and illustration, she introduced the calorie content of different foods, transforming dry data into an engaging visual language.
When Yuanny joined WASCZ five years ago, she says she had felt somewhat insecure at her previous school.
“At WASCZ, I became a little more confident.” She remains somewhat reserved, but this transformation grew from countless small moments. During a school badminton competition, for example, she represented her College as one of its key players. “Although we didn’t achieve a particularly high ranking, it was something I felt incredibly proud of,” she recalls. Throughout her journey, she is especially grateful to her Art teacher, Ms Liu. “From when I first started learning Art to applying to university, she gave me so much support.”
Life at WASCZ has been rich and fulfilling, bringing together countless experiences that have helped Yuanny become a more confident version of herself.
Looking ahead, Yuanny hopes to learn a new language at university. “That way, I can reach a wider world,” she says. Curiosity was the beginning of her artistic dream; confidence is what gives her the courage to embrace new experiences. We look forward to seeing where these qualities take her as she continues towards new horizons and discovers an even more extraordinary world.
To respect every talent and nurture every passion—that is the foundation of the holistic education WASCZ has always championed. And so, five seeds of artistic passion have taken root, grown and begun to bloom in this nurturing environment. Now, these young artists are setting sail towards a wider world of art.
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