Every picture starts a story. These images represent the me I am thanks to the many lives that I have been living as Media Mike, Media Dada, poet, photographer, filmmaker, Mickey Chance, Hap Hazard, community activist, artist, Mike Hazard, and __________.
FYI, the stories that caption each picture are not visible on a cellphone. For the whole shebang, use larger devices.
I have always been curious. My mother could never recall how the fireman got me out of the bucket.
My mother Mary Hazard read, wrote, and taught. A Renaissance scholar with an acute sense of social justice, her life work, Elizabethan Silent Language, taught me everything we make communicates.
My father Patrick Hazard was a reader, a writer, and a teacher too. He called himself the world’s worst documentary filmmaker, and he was a contender. He gave me a love for poetry and put a camera in my hands, giving me a life work. I am a poet with a camera.
My name is Media Mike and I am a pareidoliac. The picture is named after my grandfather, Hap Hazard. My first solo show was Media Mike’s Mask Museum at Rourke Art Gallery in Moorhead.
My family traveled all over the world. Our dog, Barnaby, loved to nose the wind on the road. Me too.
I earned a degree in art and English at Carleton and Macalester Colleges. The pop art whimsy of Tea for Two still amuses.
I made my first film, a portrait of the poet Robert Bly, when I was a neighborhood artist in residence. Working in a community changed me from an abstract expressionist artist in a garret to an artist with a vision of community engagement and social justice.
I ran a creative design studio for 25 years. The clients included Weisman Art Museum, Bob Dylan, and Mayor George Latimer. The Mayor is seen here with yours truly sporting a Latimer mask.
Pictures, I’m always making pictures. I make pictures to see, to share, and to remember. Do you see the Elephantom? The picture is from an ever-growing collection of images and poetry about animals, Media Mike’s Menagerie.
Spectacle is a portrait of my daughter, Sonia. The pose was her idea. Now a professor of religious studies, her life makes me sublimely proud.
A portrait of the poet Thomas McGrath was my first national telecast on PBS. His dream of changing the world with his writing has become mine. My video work has now enjoyed eight national telecasts on public media as well as numerous local broadcasts.
I am a keen community activist for public media. The Twins TV Newsbuggy was a vehicle for making and showing unwanted television. Media Dada was me. Rick Souther clicked the picture.
Weird Wood is one of my life themes. It is an ever-evolving collection of camera works and poems about the garden. Kirby Puckett is Bat Man. The picture is part of a video poem titled Weird Wood which played at and was acquired by the Museum of Modern Art (NY).
David Bengtson is a fine poet and a great teacher. He taught me that using a model is a powerful teaching tool. We see, we do. David has served as a model teacher for yours truly. Photo’s by Sue Farmer.
Peace House, a homeless shelter in Minneapolis, has become a home away from home. I have been filming and photographing there since 2005.
A favorite exhibition was The Birds of Paradise at Rourke Art Museum. I used performance, poetry, found objects, assemblage, paper movies, video, and camera works to illuminate the nature of birds. My own work was presented with a selection of art from the museum.
I earn a good living as a teaching artist with The Center for International Education. It’s a micro-nonprofit which I incorporated in 1975. I teach people of all ages how to express themselves with still and video cameras. I’m always looking for new work.
Photographing the Hmong American Farmers Association farm changed the way I eat. I turned into a plant eater. Art and life intertwine.
I love to walk, camera in hand and notebook in pocket, and see what I can see. Every picture I make is a love story.