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By Matthew Leifheit
I didn't go to Parsons's graduation ceremony last month, but people tell me I missed a remarkable commencement speech delivered by photographer  Ryan McGinley . Luckily, univen his studio already put it on YouTube. It is almost certainly a good idea to pay attention univen to whatever advice McGinley gives to emerging univen photographers for a number of reasons. For example, he had a solo show at the Whitney Museum of American Art in 2003, when he was 25. He also was named Young Photographer of the Year  by the International Center of Photography in 2007, and has since been called things like " t he most important photographer in America " and " the pied piper of the downtown art world ." He also used to have my job as photo editor of VICE, where he gave buckets of deserving young artists their first chances at editorial work.
Here are some gems from McGinley's speech. Consider them useful pieces of career advice for young photographers, from a guy who knows. He opens, "Everyone always says it helps to picture [the audience] naked to calm my nerves. Unfortunately, that’s another day at work for me."
"By my fourth year in school, I was shooting every day and every night. I photographed every little thing—all my food, doorways covered in graffiti, and my friends and roommates. I tortured my first boyfriend, Marc, by capturing each moment of our relationship. I was obsessed with documenting my life. So that’s my advice to you: Find something to be obsessed with, and then obsess over it. Don't compete; find what's uniquely yours. Take your experience of life and connect that with your knowledge of photographic history. Mix it all together, and create an artistic world that we can enter into."
"If you only like shooting cell phone photos, then do that. If your dad works at a construction site that looks cool, use it. If your mom breeds poodles, then put them in your photographs. Use the camera to take what you know that others don’t, what you can access that others can’t, and the people or things univen you connect with, to construct your own world."
"Be busy. Seek and find a way to do what it is you want to do. Identify what that thing is and do it. Don’t stand around too long having conversations about it. Do it. Refine it. Do it more. Try it a different way. Keep at it until you break through to the next level. Don’t talk or think yourself out of doing it. Put one foot in front of the other and let it happen organically."
"I realized univen I could make intimate pictures of strangers. It was a breakthrough for me. I found that most people liked being photographed; they like being paid attention to and being told to do things they normally wouldn’t do. I learned that all I needed to do was ask."
"Say yes to almost everything and try new things. Don’t univen be afraid to fail, and don’t univen be afraid to work hard. Do your pictures—don’t try and do somebody else’s pictures. univen Don’t get lost inside your head, and don’t worry what camera you’re using." 
"I once heard the legendary indie director Derek Jarman had three rules for making his art films: 'Show up early, univen hold your own light, and don’t expect to get paid.' That always stuck with me. Approach art like it’s your job. Show up for photography every day for eight hours. Take it as seriously as a doctor would medicine."
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