Member Spotlight: David Vines

Hey David! Can you share a bit about your background and what sparked your passion for photography?

I’m a lifelong New Yorker who’s always gravitated toward photography as a way to document the things I love about this city. When I first got a digital camera in high school, I was immediately drawn to shooting in locations I knew intimately from my childhood that were slated for demolition or whose existence seemed tenuous in an ever-changing city. I brought my camera with me to see the final scraps of Shea Stadium as it stood in a pile of rubble, I went next door to see Willets Point while its streets were still littered with chop-shops and lake-sized potholes, and I went to the graffiti mecca of 5 Pointz before it was bulldozed and turned into luxury apartments.

I shot sparingly for most of the 2010s, but I picked my old digital camera back up during COVID during my solitary ventures out to Central Park. After months holed up indoors, I became captivated by the birds and urban wildlife of the park. I grew to love Barry the Barred Owl, who made her home in a Hemlock Tree by the Central Park Boathouse, and the tufted titmice that would fly into my palm in search of seeds and peanuts. After a few years deliberating and demurring, I finally took the plunge into film photography in late 2024 and I haven’t looked back since.

How did you first come across CMC, and what drew you to become part of the collective?

I found CMC as I was scrolling through Instagram and saw a story from one of my mutuals and fellow uptown photographers, Nick Grinder, posting stories from a meeting and photo critique session. I went to my first meeting the next month and I love being a part of this creative and supportive community.

As it happens, just a few days ago after our most recent meeting, I got a DM from another mutual who saw my post from a CMC meeting who told me he was interested in joining. The cycle continues.

Is there a particular theme or subject that captivates you the most in your photography? If so, what is it, and what pulls you towards it? If not, what do you typically focus on in your work, and why?
Much like when I first picked up a camera, I often find myself trying to document things that may seem mundane today, but catch my eye as something I’ll treasure to have documentation of once it’s gone. To that end, one of the things that pushed me over the edge to start shooting on film was the impending retirement of the R46 subway cars with the mood lighting and the orange seats.

I enjoy street photography, but rather than intimate, up close street action shots, I tend to gravitate most to photos featuring just a single person isolated in a typically bustling location. When I go out to shoot, I’m often trying to conjure a vaguely surrealist atmosphere and elicit feelings of solitude and isolation in a dense urban environment.

Could you share around 5-8 images from your most recent project or photo series? We’d love to hear the story behind these works and what inspired the project.

My film photo collage project began with my very first roll of film. My goal was simply to get a feel for the visual effect of different film stock by shooting from a common location each time I popped a new roll of film into my camera. Fortunately, I live within walking distance of J. Hood Wright Park in Washington Heights, which has a beautiful panoramic view of the George Washington Bridge. I’d initially thought about aligning them vertically side by side, but after I had about a dozen shots in this collection, I quickly pivoted to an alignment that more resembled mosaic-style square tiles, drawing inspiration from the enduring public art and visual identity of the New York City subway.

I fell in love with this visual style and put together more of these film photo collages. Next, I captured the visually eclectic and unmistakably modern-looking bodega on my corner. Between March and October of 2025, I created a collage from an amalgamation of 43 photos of Mister Softee trucks scattered across the city. These collages are time-intensive yet incredibly satisfying. My most recently completed work featuring the interior of an R46 subway car with a lone man playing guitar at the center was the culmination of my goal to document that vanishing train with my taste for capturing solitary people.

My goal with these collages has been to showcase a distinctly urban cityscape in a manner that blends day with night and visual elements from changing seasons to create a dreamlike blend of past, present, and future.