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There was no luxury. I never got on an airplane until I was 18. We drove everywhere. My dad was like, Waste not, want not.

Ryan McGinley

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Ryan McGinley
Age: 47
Born: 1977
Born: October 17
Photographer
Ramsey
New Jersey
Never
Like
Drove
Airplane
Luxury
Everywhere
Dad
Waste

More quotes by Ryan McGinley

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I'm going to put every aspect of myself out into the world and try to convey it through photography.
Ryan McGinley
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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.
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The cool thing for me about moving to New York was that I got to create a new family.
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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.
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Everyone I'm photographing, I feel like I'm remaking a family, in a way. My brothers and sisters are my heroes. So many of my models resemble them.
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All I do is make photos. It's my life.
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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
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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.
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I went through a pretty big David Bowie period when I was younger, and that has affected me profoundly in my life and my work.
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I'm not going to hide behind anything.
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I put all of my time into art because I couldn't go back to Jersey and work at Starbucks.
Ryan McGinley
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A lot of my close friends have committed suicide or died of heroin overdoses.
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From 8 to 19, I was skateboarding every single day. That was my life. I worked at a skate shop. I watched skate videos.
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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.
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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.
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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
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I'm always interested in an atmosphere where dreams and reality mingle on equal terms.
Ryan McGinley
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In a lot of ways I look at these old photos, and I don't know if I would have been able to communicate with these people on this level if I didn't have a camera. I think I would still be so shy.
Ryan McGinley
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You find the people that you need to find. There's this gravitational pull.
Ryan McGinley
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The cool part about New York is that you can do that. You can talk to all the people you admire.
Ryan McGinley