Ashley McLean is a visual artist and director based in New York City. Working primarily with photography and video, her practice expands into sound, installation, and text, often guided by an emotional and intuitive approach to image making. She received her BFA in Photography and Video from the School of Visual Arts and studied in the Fine Arts program at the Universität der Künste Berlin in 2021. She is currently pursuing her MFA in Visual Arts at Columbia University.

McLean’s work explores themes of Black identity, masculinity, memory, and personal geography. Rooted in tenderness and sensitivity, her images often move beyond portraiture to consider the emotional residue of place and lineage. 

She has exhibited both domestically and internationally, including at the Arles Photo Festival and in the 2022 Dior Photography and Visual Arts Award for Young Talents group showcase. In 2023, she was awarded the Creator Labs Photo Fund from the Aperture Foundation and Google Pixel. Most recently, McLean was featured in Cultured Magazine’s 2025 Young photographers List.