[KELP JOURNAL] These photos evoke such a strong emotion of sadness. Isolation is a pervasive feeling of the figures that are set in the center of the composition. Was that an intentional feeling you were going for?
[HANNAH MOORE] For most of them, it was an intentional feeling. For instance, the photo of the surfer was one where that feeling of isolation was definitely intentional. I was at the beach to watch the sunrise with a friend of mine, and the beach was completely empty except for us and the surfer, which is so rare being that we are in the middle of, West Palm Beach, a fairly busy city. While isolation tends to be very closely tied to sadness, in that moment it was truly more of a peacefulness. The sailboat also has a somewhat similar story. Like the surfer, this photo was also one that I took while living in West Palm. With living in a city, it’s a bit of a rarity to find anything truly alone. The sailboat was something I used to walk by almost every day and it sat between a very busy street and a marina that was home to some very large yachts. Something about it always stuck with me about how peaceful it looked despite being surrounded by a very loud and chaotic world.
[KJ] Place is an important part of these photos and your travels have taken you all over the world. Can you talk about what inspires you and what you capture on your travels?
[HM] My inspiration is a bit of a cliché, but the one word that has always stuck with me is beauty. I think that being able to see the beauty in everything--even the small, mundane things--is not only important, but a skill that can take time to master. We live in a very chaotic world, we always have, and it’s very easy to let it consume our outlook. But being able to focus on the beauty of the complex world we live in, despite that chaos, can really do a lot for the human psyche. In one of the creative writing classes I took, the theme for the semester was Beauty, and as an assignment we had to keep a journal where all we did was list the things that we found beautiful. Everyone sort of started off with the physical things, the visual things like the sunrise or flowers. But after a while, at least for me, it became more about little experiences. The smell of coffee in the morning, listening to music in the car, little conversations with friends before class. We live in a very chaotic world, we always have, and it’s very easy to let it consume our outlook. But being able to focus on the beauty of the complex world we live in, despite that chaos, can really do a lot for the human psyche.
[KJ] I know that you are a multi-talented creator and I always wonder if such multi-talented people feel like their disciplines affect one another?
[HM] My disciplines most definitely affect one another. A majority of my writing and poetry is very much inspired by my photography, and there have been several moments where my purpose for going out and taking photos was to inspire some more writing from myself. I also think that they strengthen each other. My experience as a photographer helps me capture vivid images in my writing, and my experiences as a writer helps me see a story within a still frame. I started out as a photographer; I grew up around it, and didn’t get into writing until years later, but that experience in photography is definitely what helped me get started in writing. When I didn’t know what to write about, I just picked a photo and wrote about it.
[KJ] I also like to ask my multifaceted creators if the form of a project picks them or if they pick the form. Do you know if something is a photo or a piece of writing off the bat, or do you have to play around a bit to figure it out?
[HM] With my photography, it's definitely more of a spur of the moment thing. When I’m traveling, I like to keep a camera on me because you never know what you’re going to find. With the photo of the crane, it was very spur of the moment. I had no clue the crane would be there, and I didn’t know how long it would be there. It was one of those things where I knew I had to act fast. With my writing, there’s definitely more planning and more playing around with it. The notes app on my phone is filled with random sentences that I like the sound of or hit home with a certain theme, but I haven’t figured out how to turn it into a poem or short story. Sometimes it just takes a moment of playing around with the words, other times it takes a lot longer, other times I just have to take a break and revisit it later on.
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