Ryan McGinley’s Wet Hot American ‘Summer’

Brennan (Clear Poncho), by Ryan McGinley.

Ryan McGinley is an artist whose work captures a kind of honesty far beyond his 30 years. The irrevocability of its weight—of its importance—is both unquestionable and daunting, as each image presents us with an evocation of homoerotic undertones and youthful ambiguity. McGinley’s images, the end result of a summer crossing the country with 16 models and 4,000 rolls of film, juxtapose a kind of quiet nudity with the harshness of the outdoors—bright sunlight against pale skin, exaggerated tan lines, bare skin amid fireworks—and while these images are decidedly out of context, they are captured in a way that ignores any posing austerity. McGinley’s most recent exhibit, “I Know Where the Summer Goes,” is now on display at the Team Gallery in SoHo.