Declan Wagar

Western Lifestyle Photographer - Jackson Hole

Declan Wagar Western Lifestyle Photographer – Jackson Hole

I came to the Tetons from Georgia after studying to become an actor. I bought my first stills camera during my first season at Lost Creek, a historic dude ranch in Jackson Hole.

My fine art is black and white. My editorial is color. I need both.

The black and white work is stripped down to shape, light, and scale. It's not abstract, but the depth isn't in the image itself—it's in what the light reveals.

The color work is the opposite: life, warmth, human connection. I want my portraits to pull people off the screen. Real people in motion, not poses.

I photograph wranglers, guides, and guests in high altitude country. Early mornings when breath clouds in sub-freezing air and the afternoons could dry you out in the river. Between it all, the rhythm of work that hasn't changed much in a century.

I love making photographs that suspend disbelief — images that feel larger than the frame that holds them. That's why I do this.