Since rising to prominence in the 1990s with his photos of young, hedonistic friends in downtown Manhattan, New York City-based photographer Ryan McGinley has become one of the most respected photographers of his generation. A pioneer of both contemporary documentary and portrait photography, he’s exhibited widely in galleries around the world since 2003, when, aged 25, he became the youngest artist to have a solo show at the Whitney. As a commercial photographer, he’s shot the likes of Beyoncé, Billie Eilish, Elton John, and Brad Pitt, and has appeared in GQ, the New York Times Magazine, Vogue, and Rolling Stone. In 2017, Kathy Ryan, director of photography for the New York Times Magazine, curated an exclusive exhibition of never-before-published photographs by Ryan for WeTransfer called American Landscapes. We shared the photos alongside a freewheeling conversation between the two of them in a specially designed digital experience.
Stories with Ryan McGinley