David Winegar has been a staple in the Park City photography world for a few decades now, seen around at local art shows, the Park Silly Sunday Market, posts on Nextdoor and work adorning Elevated Interiors.
A retired Air Force-turned-Delta Airlines pilot, Winegar focused that same methodical, patient self-discipline that pilots develop to his photography, creating a name for himself and his own company, Park City Photography.
Over the years, Winegar has earned awards for his wildlife and landscape images in various prestigious competitions.
“When I kind of started down this road, what was going through my mind was ‘How do I differentiate myself from all the other photographers?’” he said. “A separator would be to put my work in front of critics and master judges and see if I could win in these competitions. So I’ve been a competitor pretty much for 20 years, with a lot of humble pie in there.”
I love what God’s created, and I like to bear witness to it and capture it through the lens and then make a beautiful art piece out of it.”
Davide Winegar, award-winning Park City-based fine art photographer
Most recently, his awards have included his image “Leap of Faith,” a photo of a fox leaping over a stream with two ground squirrels in its mouth, winning International Best of Category Wildlife in 2007 at the Art Wolfe Environmental Photographic Invitational; “Better,” a photo of a man looking up at a huge poster of a woman, winning First Place for Outstanding Achievement in the ninth annual International Color Awards Professional Division People Category; “Final Pass,” an image of a DC-10 tanker fighting the Parleys Canyon fire, helping him earn the 2022 Intermountain Professional Photographers Association‘s Photographer of the Year Award.
And he just doesn’t stop. This spring, his piece titled “First Snow On Fall Leaves – La Sal Range – Moab Utah” was one of the 276 pieces out of 1,450 submissions chosen for the 100th Annual Spring Salon exhibition at the Springville Museum of Art.
Being selected for his exhibit, which runs through July 6, further validates Winegar’s eye and process for developing the perfect image, in part natural gift and dedicated study.
“From the beginning, I’ve always been a big consumer of training. So I’ve been to probably over a thousand courses that I’ve taken, from weekend lectures and seminars, to my participation in the Professional Photographers of America, and then the Intermountain Professional Photographers Association, where they have annual competitions,” he said.
He also got a formal education and graduated from the New York Institute of Photography in 2015, always interested in making wildlife and landscapes his subject.
While it’s rarely a lucrative art, pursuing landscape photography is worth the long hours, early mornings and challenging natural elements, Winegar said.
“I love what God’s created, and I like to bear witness to it and capture it through the lens and then make a beautiful art piece out of it,” he said.
Part of his natural talent involves pre-visualizing a scene he intends to capture, and then it’s practice, practice, practice.
“You can spend all of that time in lectures and seminars, unless you get behind the camera and have a complete command of both the technical operation of the camera and to deliver your artistic vision, … it’s getting behind the camera on a regular basis and that means multiple times a week, going to field and shooting with purpose,” Winegar said.
For him, this can mean going out to the same place, shooting the same tree over and over until the light is just right. An example would be his series of photos titled “Ancient Lonely Bristlecone at Dead Horse State Park,” which depicts the same tree under a moonless sky, or in the dim light of dawn.
The piece that will be shown at the Springville Art Museum was a combination of this right place, right time coincidence, and his methodical forethought.
“This was October of ’21, big snowstorm, and the leaves were all in the trees on the La Sal loop which is a loop road that goes through the La Sal mountain range,” he remembered. “And I thought that night, ‘Man, this is the first big snow, and those leaves are going to be informed by those first snowflakes, and that is really going to be pretty.’”
He got up before light and drove up to Warner Lake, where aspen covers the hillsides. Four inches of fresh snow had fallen, untouched by wind.
“It’s a short time period between when you lose those leaves and rare to get that first snow and not have lost the leaves,” he said, and spent hours that day taking photos.
The result was a tangle of branches, juxtaposed with bright snow and the yellow of autumn leaves. Once Winegar chose his best shot, he sent it in to be made as a chromogenic print, pioneered by photographers like Ernst Haas.
“When you see it, it’s like you can walk into the forest. And that’s what I love about the Chromogenic process,” Winegar said. “It’s a museum quality look that, when you see it … there’s a difference. It’s absolutely three dimensional.”
The printing process is long and expensive, he said, but worth the money for many of his photos. Some of the images displayed at Elevated Interiors are printed in this way, adding emphasis to their already striking scenes.
With his acceptance into the Spring Salon exhibit, Winegar’s years of learning and hard work continue to pay off. Now, starting his Park City Photography School, Winegar hopes to pass on his knowledge to others.
“I’ve just started doing some private instruction,” Winegar said. “I have a syllabus that I’ve worked up and the classes are anywhere from three to six hours depending on what my client would like to focus on.”
Winegar also participates in the Park City Photography Club, which meets for monthly lectures, usually at the Park City Library.
“You get to associate with people that are passionate about photography and anybody with any skill level can come and we keep the lectures so everybody can understand them,” Winegar said.
He continues to search for the next photo, planning to photograph ospreys and burrowing owls on Antelope Island in the coming weeks.
“You get where you have a knowledge of certain animals and the time of year best to photograph them. Pretty much there’s always a month that there’s something cool that you can go out and use as your subject matter in the wildlife kingdom,” he said.
“First Snow On Fall Leaves – La Sal Range – Moab Utah” and other works by Utah-based artists can be seen at the Springville Museum of Art daily, except Sundays, through July 6.
Meanwhile, Winegar will keep pursuing what he loves.
“What my goal was back then, and continues to be, I’m always trying to learn more,” he said.
