Harris’s grandfather was an amateur photographer who influenced the artist’s interests in the photographic medium. Harris went on to obtain a BA in studio art from Wesleyan University and an MFA in photography and media from the California Institute of the Arts. During his time there, he further cultivated his interests in representation, identity construction, performance, and cultural narratives, befriending artists and cultural critics such as Marlon Riggs, bell hooks, and Isaac Julien along the way. He also participated in the Whitney Museum Independent Study Program in 1992.

Harris’s work employs both portraiture and self-portraiture to reinterpret cultural icons and public discourse surrounding race. Queerness is central to Harris’s work—he often incorporates props, makeup, and dress in his photographs. The artist’s engagements with self-fashioning, disguise, and drag also point to the interdisciplinary nature of his artistic practice. His work was featured in an exhibition at the Studio Museum in Harlem titled Lyle Ashton Harris: Self/Portrait, in 2011, which brought together a selection of Polaroids shot by the artist from 1998 to 2008.

Harris’s work has been featured in shows at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; Walker Art Center, Minneapolis; Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; National Portrait Gallery, Washington, DC; and the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York. His work was included in the Busan Biennial (2008); the São Paulo Biennial (2016); the Whitney Biennial (2017); and the Venice Biennale (2007). Among his numerous accolades, Harris received a fellowship from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation (2016); the David C. Driskell Prize from the High Museum of Art, Atlanta (2014); and the Rome Prize Fellowship (2001). The Studio Museum first acquired Harris’s work in 2003.