David Vestal

David Vestal was an American photographer of the New York school, a critic, and teacher.

Vestal was born on March 21, 1924, in Menlo Park, California. He studied painting at the Art Institute of Chicago but took up photography during the late 1940s after moving to New York where the majority of his street photography and cityscapes were made.

From the mid-fifties Vestal exhibited his photography and was included in eight exhibitions at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, where his work is included in its collections and at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art, and the Art Institute of Chicago. He was the recipient of John Simon Guggenheim Fellowships in 1966 and 1973.

A lifelong educator, he taught at Parsons School of Design, the School of Visual Arts, and at Pratt Institute, and also gave numerous lectures and workshops around the country.

A frequent writer on the medium, his column, "Vestal at Large," was a regular feature in Photo Techniques magazine, and his books include The Art of Black and White Enlarging (1984) and The Craft of Photography (1975).

Vestal died on December 14, 2013, at his home in Bethlehem, Connecticut.

Text courtesy of Wikipedia, 2023