Quote

All I do is make photos. It's my life.

Ryan McGinley

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Ryan McGinley
Age: 47
Born: 1977
Born: October 17
Photographer
Ramsey
New Jersey
Photos
Make
Life

More quotes by Ryan McGinley

Image
You find the people that you need to find. There's this gravitational pull.
Ryan McGinley
Image
I didn't have to be friends with people who were into pop music.
Ryan McGinley
Image
I don't want to be an artist that gets stuck doing one thing. I don't want to be an artist who people look back at and say, 'His early work was really great.
Ryan McGinley
Image
The cool thing for me about moving to New York was that I got to create a new family.
Ryan McGinley
Image
Just having the camera, being able to pull back from situations and be an observer, it saved my life... I realised I could find these intimate moments and that people trusted me. That, basically, my camera was magic.
Ryan McGinley
Image
I was growing up in the suburbs I was one of eight kids. So I did have a community when I was younger, but all of my brothers and sisters were older.
Ryan McGinley
Image
All my work, really, is based on my brothers and sisters. I had so many adventures with them and a big part of the work is to recreate those. It's easy for me to be around a lot of people, because I can retreat. I can watch everything.
Ryan McGinley
Image
I'm not going to hide behind anything.
Ryan McGinley
Image
I think that's an important lesson for young people who want to be artists: You have to find someone who believes in you and who will help you find that time where you don't have to think about a job but just making work. If I didn't have those people in my life, I wouldn't be in the position I'm in.
Ryan McGinley
Image
Just being friends with people now for over 15 years, you realize what we all came out of. What we came out of was the intense feeling of growing up. It sounds kind of cliché, but it's true.
Ryan McGinley
Image
Most of the e-mails I get nowadays are from students who ask me how I got my start. In truth its from having a really supportive family but also having a good patron who will help you - like financing all those early trips I took.
Ryan McGinley
Image
Whatever emotions you're going through, you somehow seek out the people that are going through similar emotions or that maybe have something you need.
Ryan McGinley
Image
I was studying graphic design at the time, when negative scanners and all that stuff was coming out, and you could do it all in your apartment. So I would shoot, make contact sheets, scan all the cool negatives, and make all these zines and books of my photos to give to my friends. I was really into zine- and bookmaking from skate culture.
Ryan McGinley
Image
A lot of my close friends have committed suicide or died of heroin overdoses.
Ryan McGinley
Image
I put all of my time into art because I couldn't go back to Jersey and work at Starbucks.
Ryan McGinley
Image
I spent all of my money on film. I remember I would do these set-design jobs or transcribe or just anything to get, like, a $100 check and go immediately to Adorama and buy expired film.
Ryan McGinley
Image
A lot of people, even my parents, thought, Art school, I don't know. We'll support you but the success rate for artists is really slim.
Ryan McGinley
Image
It's weird being a photographer because you really have to divorce yourself from the image.
Ryan McGinley
Image
I want to venture into film more, and I think that a nice way to transition into doing that would be a documentary. I think it would be interesting to find one person that really fascinated me or maybe a band and travel with them, but I don't think I could do it like I used to do it.
Ryan McGinley
Image
Everyone started to have a camera. That's when I started to travel outside of New York and go into nature.
Ryan McGinley