Ryan McGinley: Way Far

by Ryan McGinley (Artist), David Rimanelli (Text)

"…the most important photographer in America…” —GQ magazine

In his second book for Rizzoli, Ryan McGinley focuses on the work that he has become best known for since he first rose to prominence ten years ago: the summer road trips. 
Since the earliest days of his unparalleled career, every summer McGinley has gathered up a group of thirty college-age kids, rented a bus, and set out on a cross-country trip. These trips—now legendary among the artist’s large coterie of friends and collaborators and the art world at large—and the photographs created during them have established him as the most consequential photographer of his generation. In the photos, McGinley documents the summertime explorations and exploits of a group of twentysomethings but also renders something much more fleeting and ineffable: the freedom and abandon of youth. Whether hiking on peat-covered mountains, swimming in crystalline lakes, rolling around in vast fields of tall grass, or squatting in derelict countryside barns, the artist’s photographs of young, naked bodies in pastoral scenes have been his signature, and his triumph has been his ability to evoke innocence and nostalgia with flashes of sexual brio. McGinley’s work has continued to deliver on the promise it made nearly a decade ago—that he is the most influential and important chronicler of his generation.

Genres: Photography, Art

240 pages, Hardcover

First published October 20, 2015

Reviews

[Tom Hill · Rating 4 out of 5]

What the summary here describes and what the forward of the book describes tells you all you need to know about McGinley's work, although they do not fully convey its power. Yes, most of his photos here and elsewhere are of nude young people. But it isn't (just) sexual. His work is about the fleeting nature of the beauty that accompanies youth, both physical beauty and the attitude and feeling of being young. It's not the only kind of beauty in life, but it's a distinct kind, with an expiration date, and McGinley is uniquely talented at capturing that immediacy and intimacy. And death lingers at the edges too. These photos will likely spark yearning and a restlessness in young and old alike.

[Lucy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love this series by Ryan McGinley. Stunning formal and technical elements. The intersection of youthful vigor, sex, and the implied, death. But also just absolutely beautiful and exuberant.