Photographer Interview: Moye


MOYE Photographer self portrait
View Moye’s photography online.

D&B: Where are you from?
MOYE: (laughing) That is always such a loaded questions for me and I get it often. As usual, I keep it short and sweet. I was born in Nuremberg, Germany and my youth was full of new place and things all the time. Never lived anywhere for more than 2 – 3 years up until about 10th grade.

D&B: What kind of photography do you shoot and how did you get started – any “formal” training?
MOYE: I don’t associate my self with one kind of photography, however I do photograph people a lot. I love the emotion in their face. I love creating with all of their emotions and all the energy they exude, and mostly I enjoy finding myself in others.

I have no formal training. I am a self-taught photographer.

D&B: What cameras or techniques do you use?
MOYE: At the present time I use Nikon Digital equipment and Adobe Photoshop. My Adobe Photoshop use is very minimal, though I’m quite familiar with the program.

D&B: Who are your mentors (in photography)?
MOYE: I have no photography mentors, though I admire the work of a few photographers, but painters like Frida and O’Keefe really speak to me as visual artists.

D&B: Have you experienced any setbacks or different treatment along your photography career that you would attribute to being a woman and/or photographer of color? (this question is optional)
MOYE: If I have, it has gone over my head. I am so involved in my art and my vision for my art, that if anyone has even attempted to hold me back in anyway, then it was exactly that “an attempt.” For me, there are no Plan B’s or C’s, my art is my purpose and passion and I can’t help but live in that at every moment and everyday.

D&B: When did you realize you could have a career in photography? Describe your journey towards becoming a working photographer.
MOYE: I don’t know that it was ever a realization. I have always been involved in the arts. Having an artistic way of seeing is one of the gifts I’ve been seeing. I chose to listen to that and be in that space. I was introduced to photography around the early middle school years when my cousin gave my father a Minolta Camera. My father didn’t bother with it much and so I picked it up and the journey began and my world opened up, I opened up more.

I begin to connect with others in new ways, in deeper ways. In high school I took a photography class and learned how to develop my own film, leaned about different types of films, and was introduced to a lot of the basics of photography. After high school, I enrolled in UNC – Charlotte to study photography, but I never made it to my major. I was looking for something more in my photography and personal experiences, so I left and just began exploring on my own. I worked for a photography company for a while and started my own business in the process.

D&B: What do you hope to achieve with your photography?
MOYE: I will help others and myself open doors to places untouched, to keep the catalyst alive in places already discovered, and to push the boundaries of what society views as beautiful and artistic.

D&B: What’s your dream photography project?
MOYE: To capture myself when I explode.

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