Winston Swift Boyer

{{Infobox artist

| name = Winston Boyer

| birth_name = Winston Swift Boyer

| image = Winston Portrait, Wyoming.jpg

| caption = Boyer in 2011

| birth_date = {{birth date and age|1954|06|25}}{{cite web|url=https://www.winstonboyer.com/biography|title=Winston Swift Boyer|work=www.winstonboyer.com|place=Carmel-by-the-Sea, California|access-date=July 31, 2022}}

| birth_place = Great Falls, Montana, US

| death_date =

| death_place =

| known_for = Landscape photography

| relatives = Jacques Boyer (brother)

| education = Stevenson School (high school graduate)

| awards =

| spouse =

| website = {{URL|winstonboyer.com}}

}}

Winston Swift Boyer (born June 25, 1954) is an American fine art photographer living in Carmel-by-the-Sea, California, and is best known for his color photography of landscapes in the United States and Europe.

Early life

File:La Sal Mountans Moab Utah ©WBoyer.jpg, Moab, Utah]]

He is the son of Winston Philip Boyer and Josephine Swift.{{cite news|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/106736549/obituary-for-winston-philip-j-boyer/|title=Winston Philip Boyer |work=Casper Star-Tribune |place=Casper, Wyoming |date=February 13, 2000|page=13|access-date=August 1, 2022}}{{cite book|last1=McGann|first1=Bill|last2=McGann |first2=Carol |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=V8mlwItBhhcC|title=The Story of the Tour de France 1965-2007 · Volume 2|publisher=Dog Ear Publishing, LLC|place=|date=2008|page=133 |isbn=9781598586084 |access-date=August 11, 2022}} In 1972, Boyer graduated from Robert Louis Stevenson School in Pebble Beach.{{cite web|url=http://pineconearchive.fileburstcdn.com/200918PCA.pdf|title=Carmel's Artists, Hitting the photographer's bullseye|author=Dennis Taylor|work=Carmel Pine Cone|place=Carmel-by-the-Sea, California|date=September 18, 2020|pages=25–26|access-date=August 11, 2022}}

Career

In 1974, Boyer went to France and got a job as a sports photographer covering bicycle racing.{{cite web |date=December 28, 1978 |title=Winston Smith Boyer photographs on exhibit |url=https://archive.org/details/ccarm_004341/page/n19/mode/2up?q=Boyer |access-date=July 31, 2022 |work=Carmel Pine Cone |place=Carmel-by-the-Sea, California}} During 1977, Boyer journeyed to Europe, documenting the Tour de France for cycling magazines.{{cite web|url=https://archive.org/details/wsb-monterey-herald-7.2.89-email|title=Boyer's landscape pictures on view at Carmel gallery|author=Rick Deragon|work=Monterey Herald|place=Monterey, California|date=July 2, 1989|page=4|access-date=December 20, 2023}} He compiled a collection of photographs of European landscapes, peoples, and architecture, and held numerous exhibitions in American and European galleries.

Boyer's first one-man show was at the Lakey Gallery, in Carmel-by-the-Sea, California in 1979. Boyer was described as one of six Master Printmakers in "The Artistry of Master Printmakers", a chapter in Color, a volume of the Life Library of Photography (Time/Life Books, 1981). The book contains two full-page photographs by Boyer, Night Angel, a twilight photograph of an apartment building from Nice, France, and California Coastal Vista from Morro Bay, California.{{cite book|chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/color0000time/page/208/mode/2up?q=Winston+Boyer|title=Color|author=Time-Life Books|chapter=The Artistry of Master Printmakers|publisher=Life Library of Photography|place=Alexandria, Virginia|date=1981|pages=173, 208–209|isbn=9780380705290 |access-date=August 11, 2022}} These photos were also published in the magazine Camera 35 (1981) along with a 1-page biographical overview that said when making landscapes, Boyer used two 35mm Leicas, 5 lenses and no tripod, and he did his own printing.{{cite journal |title=Cibascapes |journal=Camera 35 |first1= |last1= |date=August 1981 |volume=26 |number=8 |url=https://archive.org/details/sim_camera-thirty-five_1981-08_26_8/page/26/mode/2up |pages=26–33 }}

In the mid-1980s, while living in New York, Boyer received an advance from the Bulfinch Press imprint of Little, Brown and Company to travel the United States and assemble 64 photographs for the book American Roads. Travel writer and historian William Least Heat-Moon wrote the introduction to the book.{{cite book |last=Boyer |first=Winston Swift |url=https://archive.org/details/americanroads0000boye/page/n1/mode/2up?q=%22Winston+Swift+Boyer%22

|title=American Roads |publisher=Little, Brown and Company, Bullfinch Press |place=Canada| date=1989 |isbn=9780821217085 |access-date=2022-08-01}}

Boyer was a senior photography director for an early online editorial fashion e-magazine called Fashionlines, from the late 1990s to the early 2000s.{{cite web |url=http://www.fashionlines.com/2005/feb/aboutUsStaff.php |title=Fashionlines Staff |work=Fashionlines |place= Stanford, California |date=February 2005 |access-date=August 3, 2022}} His portfolio includes the Ocean Series, Mask Series, American Landscape, Vertigo Series, Cannery Row, American Facades, The Views, European Gallery, and Eritrea, Africa. While living on Garrapata Ridge in Big Sur for fourteen years, his Ocean Series evolved into large-scale photographs of the sea, sky, and clouds, often at sunset, from vantages in and near Big Sur.{{cite web |date=June 4, 2016 |title=Winston Boyer |url=https://matthewswiftgallery.com/artist/winston-boyer/ |access-date=August 2, 2022 |work=Matthew Swift Gallery |place=Gloucester, Massachusetts |page=}}{{cite web|url=https://www.montereycountyweekly.com/blogs/arts_culture_blog/winston-swift-boyers-color-saturated-photos-from-the-edge-of-the-continent-at-gallery-sur/article_0197e1fe-5406-11e4-9f3f-0017a43b2370.html|title=Winston Swift Boyer's color-saturated photos from the edge of the continent at Gallery Sur|date=October 14, 2014|author=Walter Ryce|work=Monterey County Weekly|access-date=August 15, 2022}}

In 2015, Boyer travelled to Eritrea, where he photographed the people, landscapes, and architecture including the Hamasien Hotel, Fiat Tagliero Building, large hand-painted signs, street wall murals, Modernist architecture, and handmade terraces. The work was published as a piece called "Inside Eritrea: from tank cemeteries to futuristic architecture-in pictures" by The Guardian.{{cite web|url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/gallery/2015/aug/17/eritrea-secretive-state-in-pictures|title=Inside Eritrea: from tank cemeteries to futuristic architecture – in pictures|work=The Guardian|place=|date=August 17, 2015|access-date=August 4, 2022}}

Boyer's work is included in the permanent collections of the Art Institute of Chicago, the Brooklyn Museum, the Corcoran Gallery of Art, the Monterey Museum of Art, the Stanford Museum, the Fresno Art Museum, and the Crocker Art Museum.

According to California Elegance Portraits from the Final Frontier (2021), Boyer has been known for his landscapes and surreal tableaux.{{cite book|first1=Christine|last1=Suppes|first2=Frederic|last2=Aranda|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kl1OEAAAQBAJ|chapter=Winston and Kate Boyer, Transforming the Ordinary|title=California Elegance, Portraits From the Final Frontier|publisher=Rizzoli|date=February 23, 2021|isbn=9788891829801 |access-date=July 31, 2022}}

Boyer lives in Carmel-by-the-Sea, California, with his wife Kathleen.{{cite web|url=https://www.winstonboyer.com/biography|title=Winston Swift Boyer|work=www.winstonboyer.com|place=Carmel-by-the-Sea, California|access-date=July 31, 2022}}

Select publications

{{cite book |last1=Swift Boyer |first1=Winston |title=American Roads |date=1989 |publisher=Bulfinch Press/Little, Brown |location=Boston |isbn=9780821217085 |oclc=19786578 |language=en|author-mask=1}}