Based in Belfast, Northern Ireland, Lesley Cherry studied at the University of Ulster, gaining her BA Hons in Fine & Applied Art and graduated from the Master of Fine Art (MFA) course in 2011. She was awarded Artists Enhancement Award (ACES) from the Arts Council of Northern Ireland (ACNI) in 2014, the ACNI ARCH Development Artists Residency in Washington DC, in 2012 as well as individual ACNI SIAP Awards in 2005, 2008, 2012, 2013, 2016, 2018/19 and 2020/21.

She was invited to attend the Ernő Tolvaly Residency, Füle, Hungary, which was funded by British Council and Arts Council NI and was an invited speaker at the Engage Summer School Residency at Padua, Italy in 2013.

She has led several high profile engagement programmes working with ex paramilitaries and single identity communities in some of the most deprived areas of Northern Ireland. These include the ACNI Re-imaging phases I and II, the North Down Council Art of Regeneration Programme, Making the Future, funded by Peace IV, a province wide programme looking at Northern Ireland’s troubled history, how it was recorded and collated and used the subsequent museum collections to engage with todays society.

She was lead artist for the Golden Thread Gallery's Procession event managed by Artichoke and 1418 NOW, and has been commissioned by the Heritage Lottery to create 3 new artworks for the Old Market House, Bangor Co Down.

She is an experienced socially engaged artist working with contentious groups across the North of Ireland, using art as a catalyst for change and discussion and has created numerous socially engaged public artworks with various working class and deprived communities , using art as a tool to highlight social issues and lobby for better services within their areas. This work influences and informs her own practice.

She is currently based at Flax Art Studios, Belfast.

She has exhibited across Ireland at The Golden Thread Gallery, Belfast, VOID, Derry, Artslink, Buncrana, Roe Valley Arts Centre, Limavady and Sligo Arts Centre, Washington DC, New York, Bilbao and is in private collections in Italy, UK, El Salvador, America, South Africa, Australia and Sir Lanka.