We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Marcus Hardy. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Marcus below.

Alright, Marcus thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Can you talk to us about a project that’s meant a lot to you?

The most meaningful project I’ve worked on was “Moon.” A multi-media project that includes a short film and a series of compositions that center around themes of family, self-love, romantic intuition, and balance in how we strive to create creative works without needing to force ourselves. Behind this project, I wanted to make something personal, meaningful, and understandingly abstract in its messaging rooted in the connection between familial connections and the celestial body of the Moon to the Earth. I had just invested in two new studio LED lights I wanted to use for potential videos/photography shoots I had in mind, which I had only done once before, but I knew in my heart I wanted to do it. Around that time, it was my sophomore year of college, and I was stalling on how to create projects that weren’t just run of the mill or in seek of attention from other people but came naturally to me. At my most vulnerable, I had asked my mom to interview me for the video because I realized I can never lie to my mother; as she raised me being an African American & Puerto Rican single mother, I held an abundance of unequivocal respect for her that I wanted her to be the interviewer and the final line in the video. What made the project so unique yet meaningful from my other work catalogs was my tenacious anxiousness to find approval from social media in my photography, my relationship failures & undesired shame/guilt I had embedded in myself through my family trauma. I wanted to explore that through the Moon. The Moon, to me, is balance, circulation, and unwavering peace, like how the tide and balance of the Earth are indebted to the Moon’s existence. Through the implication of my little brother in the second half, I see that I am the tide to the Moon that is my brother and vice versa. I felt the same way with my heritage, mother, and God (although, at the time, I was a bit agnostic). Akin to the Moon’s perfect spherical presence, family is this spherical actuality of peace, trauma, love, persistence, toughness, and relatability. In my video that corresponds with the abstract compositions of my brother, there is a heavy nuance of simplicity yet depth through the impromptu piano playing and the raw dialogue between my mother and me about the importance of letting go and not taking things too seriously. The Moon is a constant occurrence throughout the film, with zoomed-in shots of the celestial body pulsating or shown in pure grain with close-ups of my face and body exhibiting a sense of vulnerability and emotion to the foundation of the video. Finally, the matching shots of me and my brother is an allegory for the Moon’s allowing presence, where I’m more serious and vulnerable while my brother is a child acting like how a child should in essential purity and lightheartedness; it’s this comparison that shows how me and brother are both sides of the same Moon, going off each other’s tides in child-like innocence that I felt I was yearning for throughout the interview. The video ends with my mom’s final quote, “It’s just a picture,” with the final shot of the Moon encapsulating its simple ecstasy.

Marcus, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I am an African American, Puerto Rican photographer, designer, videographer, and writer who loves to create artistic projects through the perspective of how I see the world in social justice, African American Diaspora, and self-actualization of the world around us through God, love, and nature. I am the founder and leading creative artist in my brand known as MadlyHopelessMisfits or MHM, which looks to strive for the bonnetheads (a subspecies of the hammerhead not often looked upon or looked at as much as its a more popular cousin) of the world around us. I am in the BS program of Game Development & Emerging Media at St. John’s University, specializing in Photography. I got into the craft of my work because of my biological father, who gifted me an EOS M100. I remember my first composition being a digital landscape of the Brooklyn Bridge from the comfort of his BMW. Since then, I knew God had planted a seed in the soil for me to use the tool for my artistic endeavors. In my life, I always knew I wanted to be in the creative business. Even though my mother, who raised me by herself as an African American & Puerto Rican herself, works in the corporate world of America and with my admonished skills in high honors in academics, I found myself allured and leaning towards my artistic expression of what made sense to my life at any point in time. The services/creative works that I provide are abstract/surrealist compositions and videos through my perspective of the world, whether that be through the god complex, nature, or African American topics; I find myself always wanting to tackle something I’ve never done before to seek the discomfort of my intuition in my editing style or photographic style.
Additionally, I provide event photography, portraiture, and headshot services as I work for the Campus Activities Media Team to photograph specific events on Campus. For clients, whether in the event or portrait field, I find a way to seek the beauty in the subject that I’m taking a photo of, striving for the details & unique quarks of what allowed God to create everyone distinctly in his image. My style is a specific reference to the Basquiat style of handwritten/freestyle drawings & contemporary political controversy with a mix of Hiroji Kubota compositions in extravagant yet grounded & meaningful works of composition; this sets me apart through how I often am patient & particular yet present in the way I want a shot to look. Through an abundance of my work, the look & expression constitute how I feel and act in the moment of creating abstract pieces, a specific strategy that gives a uniqueness to every project I come across, showcasing a blank canvas for each. MadlyHoplessMisfits is an African American-centered brand that I have always envisioned myself going into to create awareness through specific topics that aren’t talked of enough in my eyes; there will always be a sense of radicalism in the way that I do, not conforming to the ways how a specific composition should look to other people in subverting expectations through multi-media measures. I am always up-front and open to potential projects that are intentional with my brand statement, and I always seek to create no matter what; it’s my livelihood and blood flow.

Can you talk to us about how your side-hustle turned into something more.

I started with this side hustle, notably photography, by allowing myself to create and not being judged or thwarted to do anything I didn’t want to do. When starting and getting the EOS M100 from my father, I never knew that it would be something that I wanted to do for the rest of my life; it was something that was intriguing and always open to me to express my love for the craft in the creative field. Since then, I’ve had multiple exhibitions for my work and various photoshoots that included clubs on campus, leading to that work being featured in articles, awards, and scholarships. Yet the way I started was shooting anything I could take photos of at concerts (Denzel Curry, Tyler, The Creator), the streets, and events on campus that allowed me to shoot at my pace. When you allow yourself to flesh out who you are at the beginning of your creative career through things that happen to be there, you understand your style and what works for you in the long run through being pressured to think on the spot about how the composition will be angled, focused, lit and edited when holding the camera. Even with the many thoughts and aspects I always keep in my mind in a single moment when taking a photo, photography made it easy for me to express how I wanted the art to feel and be perceived; it was never a burden to create with the camera, but a particular love and tenacious attitude that would keep me up at three am creating compositions. After this, I made the MadlyHopeslessMisfits (MHM) brand, a brand that was intensely important for me in its name and its messaging of bringing the introverted into the outspoken (specifically because I had been devoutly introverted at the time, fearing the worse of people perceiving my art but I pushed myself out of that box to where I am today). My novice experience led to my first photoshoot in November of 2023; it was a collaborative project with Caleb Puplampu, another fantastic photographer to whom I am indebted for helping me go through the networking process and setting up shoots for myself. We had garnered over thirty-plus students who wanted to take their headshots in a high school-themed backdrop shoot, which led friends and partners that take photos & conversate on aspects of how to subvert expectations in whatever we work upon. What made this project so important in my career was its meaning of my full-on dedication toward the craft, seeing myself leave from my introverted comfort to an outspoken and intuitive creative director; it set the tone for the following projects I would make through emphasizing networking, collaboration and being culturally aware in the ways I can push African American culture through my art.
I have made multiple projects, notably How They See Us, a project that looks to emphasize the dramatic stereotypes of African American through the perspective of my familial trauma and media intake. That project had only four to six models. Yet, it was one of my most meaningful and emphatic projects at the time, bringing an immense amount of attention to the brand and its intention of emphasizing black culture without judgment. This led to my getting a job at Campus Activities for being a photographer on the media team, establishing a project known as “Haraya x Redhouse,” a collaborative effort from Haraya (Pan African Society Club) and Redhouse (Fashion Club) to bring my style of street photography and African American gated communal topics into the fold. At this point, I had won the Sig Ep NY Rho Balanced Leadership Scholarship for my work and been accepted to the T. Howard Foundation, and have created a brand/style for myself that I feel proud to bring particular issues into the light—leading to my 2025 project, January – February, known as “Rally!”, a project centered around the Palestinian protests that had been going on at the time. I collaborated with the Office Of Multicultural Affairs and the program I’m a leader in, known as “Social Equity Workshop,” to have the photos for the project exhibited at the Martin Luther King Dinner Event for St. John’s. It came with resounding praise, which led to me having another exhibit in the same month for my past work, having my photos for the first exhibit framed and honored in the Sun Yat Sen building at SJU, and winning the Haraya Pan African Creative Award. I realized that as I see the world go through its political dismay and environmental chaos, the compositions notably precede me, and they fall in this realm of weight that has real stakes attached to it. Now, I am responsible for giving back and bringing people into a community of creatives to pursue awareness, love, and intuitive nature in everything I do. For creatives looking to do the same that I’ve done for myself in these years, It’s essential to have fun with the intention that you do this out of the labor of your love for the craft and with the prerogative of sharing a message that you feel can make a difference in another person’s day or life. Networking, collaborating and getting out of your comfort zone because whether you like it or not, you need to show people what you’re capable of to make money. Allow yourself the gratitude of communal infusion and loving work through what you find fun.

What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?

A particular goal or mission for the brand MHM/myself is to keep growing and expanding at my specific pace of work and allow myself to corroborate good business and fruitful creative endeavors with similar/aspiring creatives in what we can output into the world. Right now, my drive is to create a photography/artist collective at St. John’s University known as the Bonnethead Collective, a collective housing BIPOC designers, artists, photographers, videographers, and many more to bring about an art exhibit as the primary goal. Still, in its entirety, I would want the collective to precede my other founder and me; the collective will seek to harbor collaboration and networking for artists on this campus who are apprehensive to start working with others yet want to market their projects on a platform that already has an audience itself. Other than that long term, I want to be a creative director with my own business that looks to create media that corroborates the mission of MHM in its strivation to bring awareness to specific titular stories of African American, Hispanic, and minority-centered topics. I want to make my earlier hobby a loving entrenchment of art that can precede how we think of artistry worldwide for BIPOC. As for me, I hope to seek a job that can allow me to travel the world to create projects (whether mine or in a company’s vision) through a focal lens of how I see the world to corroborate a message of intercontinental communal bonding through imaging. I hope to become the looking glass for many poverty-stricken or hard-working individuals who don’t have the chance to see the world for themselves and that we are united through God’s will in similar ways of life.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://marcusjadenhardy.myportfolio.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/madlyhopelessmisfits
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/marcusjhardy

Image Credits

How They See Us (2024) – Models: Jade Bolden & Anthony
Photographers: Marcus Hardy (MadlyHoeplessMisfits) & Caleb Puplampu

Moon (2024) – Model: Bryce Booker | Photographer – Marcus Hardy (MadlyHopelessMisfits)

Rally (2025) – Photographer – Marcus Hardy (MadlyHopelessMisfits)

Haraya X Redhouse (2024) – Model: Kika Agboifo | Photographer – Marcus Hardy (MadlyHopelessMisfits)

I Love God, Sun Bathin! (2025) – Currently Work In Progress | Photographer – Marcus Hardy (MadlyHopelessMisfits)

“High” School (2023) – Model: Caleb Puplampu

Football x Hooligans (2024) – Model: Adia Bush – Salmata Mari