Moses Hooper - Artist of Faith Interview
Moses Hooper - Who is he?
Moses Hooper is the video producer at George Fox University. He was hired on a few months ago and I’ve had the wonderful pleasure of working and learning from him. However, because he’s new, I still don’t know him too well. Thus, I felt like he would be a great person to interview, especially because I am graduating this semester and will no longer be working with him. This year, I have been focusing most of my time on developing my video production skills. This is mainly because all three of my jobs have ended up revolving around videography. In fact, the Lord has been opening up more and more video opportunities even after graduation as a result of it: such as wedding videography. I am beyond thankful. I also wanted to interview someone in the video world because I’ve already talked with a lot of designers. I am more knowledgeable about design and would love to be more knowledgeable about video since it is also a deep passion of mine.
In my interview, I asked Moses four simple questions. Thankfully, he’s a talker so the interview actually lasted quite a long time. I recorded our interview so I have included a few direct quotes in his answers.
This was technically a collaborative project with Moses. He edited it together but he used some of my football tailgate and game footage.
What faith practices feed/give you life?
The faith practices that give Moses life are attending church and his community there. They allow him to get outside of his own head and fill his cup back up. He says that Sundays are a day of reorientation for him. He doesn’t want his faith to be outside of the rest of his life. Outside of work and church, his personal relationship with Christ is also life-giving. I like this quote that he said directly “when it comes to one on one time with the Lord, I recognize it comes with a fight…it’s not easy to carve out time but it has become part of the practice of walking in faith”.
My favorite part of his response: He was talking about a run he went on the other day and said “Recognizing the Creator beyond the creation is a fun hide and seek thing me and the Lord do…it is incredible: I am a creation, running inside of a created world, in which my Creator, that I know personally, designed for my enjoyment…I get to enjoy this moment because He created it for me to enjoy”. I LOVED that. Sometimes I truly do get caught up in thinking about how many people I can share the good news with so they can spend eternity in this creation. But God also created it for me to rest and enjoy it. I forget that sometimes. I’m going to challenge myself to spend one night in the next month just going out simply to watch the sunset. I’m excited. Thanks Moses for inspiring me.
This was also a collaborative video between Moses and I.
How do your faith practices influence your work/art?
“When I step back from my work and I realize that the Creator who is creative has created me for good works, I see an infinite sea of possibilities that I can venture into…how do I use my mind to access the full creativity that God has ordained for His creation”? Moses is thankful that the Lord has blessed him in having a creative mind. He is grateful for even the opportunity to create.
The part that resonated the most with me: “I know there is an exhausting point…like if I was to sit here and work without a time frame, without end, my ability to create would diminish and eventually exhaust…and so I realize stepping away from my work to recharge and be with the Lord…in that process I’m regaining creative ideas”. I needed to hear this. In fact, the Lord knew I needed to hear this because this exact thought resurfaced again after my interview with Moses. Someone in class mentioned that they sometimes need to stop creating to be able to create again. This semester I have worked myself to burnout. Thankfully, I’m not super burnt out on creating, but I know I’m not doing my best work because I haven’t had time to rest.
How has your faith influenced your relationship with your clients?
Moses answered this by saying that faith has been a lot of the reason that he’s even had clients. His faith has been instrumental in building his relationships with clients. He mentioned that he has received the most honest and constructive feedback from faith-based clients. They don’t sugarcoat the truth and have helped him develop in his career and character. The work that you do for a person of faith also has a deeper meaning. The work means more and so does the relationship. Side note: I think Moses’ intent was pure on this one and I know the point he was trying to get across. He has given me wonderful advice outside of this interview in which he encouraged me to bring my faith into very dark places too: such as the music industry making music videos if I’m so called to do so. He summed up his answer by saying, “There’s a lot of weight I would place in my development and the work of the Lord in my life that is in direct proportion to how my career has been shaped and how the clients have been”.
What has your experience been with serving your work? If you think about your previous work, is there a piece you’ve made well with an open mind to its end versus one that you made for a specific purpose in a specific way?
Moses talked about two non profits that he worked with over the last few years. One was a labor of love and one was a labor of hardship. The labor of love was serving a group of people’s deepest needs. The latter was volume, fast turn over projects, rigorous nuts and bolts storytelling. The first one was you submit this multiple times until we get it right and the latter was “this is good enough”. Although the labor of love was tough, it had high, timeless impact. The latter, however, didn’t involve a lot of creative thought and lowered its standards. “Work that becomes beauty is timeless whereas work that becomes propaganda is a contrived, disconnected, consumerist approach to storytelling”.
My favorite part of his response: “People are more interested in getting a reaction out of others than creating for the sake of imitating their Creator”. This, I think, is a perfect way to end this blog post. It is such a good call to action. I hope to always create for the sake of revealing Christ. I hope to serve my work well so that my work can serve for God’s glory. So cool.