Ryan McGinley Quotes

I didn't have much of a life in crime as a graffiti writer.

My photographs are a celebration of life, fun and the beautiful. They are a world that doesn't exist. A fantasy. Freedom is real. There are no rules. The life I wish I was living.

I've been attracted to Kate Moss since I was a teenager.

It's weird being a photographer because you really have to divorce yourself from the 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.

I think the driving force when I moved to New York was the fear of going home with my tail between my legs.

I'm not going to hide behind anything.

Everyone started to have a camera. That's when I started to travel outside of New York and go into nature.

I didn't have to be friends with people who were into pop music.

I put all of my time into art because I couldn't go back to Jersey and work at Starbucks.

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."

I knew my ticket out of the suburbs was art school, so I worked really hard to develop my portfolio and get a scholarship.

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."

I was pretty Irish Catholic Jersey, the middle of the line.

I couldn't wait to come to New York to reinvent myself.

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.

The cool thing for me about moving to New York was that I got to create a new family.

I was voted most artistic in school.

A camera gives you a purpose.

I'm going to put every aspect of myself out into the world and try to convey it through photography.

Actually, I didn't study photography at first. I went to school for painting my first year, poetry my second year, graphic design my third and fourth year, and photography my fifth.

From 8 to 19, I was skateboarding every single day. That was my life. I worked at a skate shop. I watched skate videos.

Growing up, my room was covered in posters. I was like, "I want to make posters."

The cool part about New York is that you can do that. You can talk to all the people you admire.

A lot of artists need structure.

I'm just a photographer, not a movie star.

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.

I just remember how excited I was to have a boyfriend and be in love and to document it.

I'm making the art for me first. I'm making it because these are the pictures I want to see. I'm making pictures that don't yet exist.

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.

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

I'm always interested in an atmosphere where dreams and reality mingle on equal terms.

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.

I know that my mind is so A.D.D., and I want instant gratification - and photography can provide me with that - but at some point, I want to make an independent feature.

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.

When I moved to New York, I was still in the closet.

I'm interested in reaching the masses with my work. It's one of my goals.

What I really believe is that there are no coincidences anymore.

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.

You find the people that you need to find. There's this gravitational pull.

I have absolutely no interest in creating depressing images.

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.

The thing about being a photographer that's so cool is that you get to participate, but you also get to disappear. The camera is in front of your face all the time.

I think a lot about control nowadays, and I really want to let go and just be more in the moment.

The camera gives you some control.