William Gray Harris
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William Gray Harris (born 1948) is an American photographer, videographer, and digital artist whose work has appeared on album covers, and in books, magazines, and newspapers throughout the world. Harris worked in Hollywood for four decades, creating portraits of celebrities and notables, as well as photographing products, architecture, and interiors.
Harris was born in San Francisco, the second son of Robert Cronley Harris, an attorney, and Nancy Gray Harris. He attended the Town School For Boys for eight years, where his art instructor, Sam Provenzano, a renowned local teacher, recognised his talent. Provenzano, an abstract expressionist painter who had studied in Paris, Florence, Mexico City, and New York, tutored Harris privately.
Harris graduated from the Stevenson School, a college preparatory boarding school in Pebble Beach, CA. On a visit to Los Angeles, he was introduced to contemporary art dealer Nicholas Wilder, who inspired him move to Los Angeles and attend the University of Southern California, where he earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Art History in 1971. Upon graduation, he studied film-making technique and theory with Jordan Belson in San Francisco. From 1975 to 1983 he taught photography and video at the Besant Hill School in Ojai Valley, CA.
In 1971, Harris was the first individual on the West coast to purchase a Sony Portapak AV-3400, a battery-powered analog video tape recording system. In 1973, a selection of stills from his early videotapes was published in Radical Software. His abstract videos and prints were shown in a one-man exhibition at the Ventura College New Media Gallery in 1975. From 1974 through the 1980s, he used a Sony VO-3800 ¾ inch U-matic videotape cassette system to document performances by legendary jazz musicians such as Dorothy Donegan, Anita O’Day, and others.
Prints by Harris made with the 3M Color-in-Color machine were included in “Electroworks,” a groundbreaking traveling exhibition organised by the International Museum of Photography in Rochester, NY., in 1979. His “Electrostatic Self Portrait,” 1973, was reproduced full-bleed in the exhibition catalogue and in several books and magazine reviews of the exhibition. It was recently featured on the cover of The Classic Photography Magazine #7, Spring 2022.
In 1984, Harris began his career in Hollywood as a portrait photographer for actors, models, singers, and musicians. He also photographed artworks, exhibitions, architecture, and interiors for designer Tony Duquette, and others. His fine art photographs were exhibited at galleries in Los Angeles and New York.
At the turn of the 21st century, Harris began creating digital images for web-based media and large scale digital transfer prints. He lives in a 1,000 year-old tower in Sutri, Italy, where he makes digital images of Italian artistic heritage including views of ancient Rome, and of historic villas, gardens, and churches.
Notable Book Jacket Portraits
- Eartha Kitt: Confessions of a Sex Kitten; 1989 (back cover)
- Lives in the Shadow with J. Krishnamurti, by Radha Rajagopal Sloss, 1991
- Dustin Hoffman; AFI Life Achievement Award book, 1999
- Harrison Ford; AFI Life Achievement Award book, 2000
- Tony Duquette: More is More; 2009 (frontispiece portrait)
- Every Exit is an Entry: The Life and Work of Liam O’Gallagher, 2009.
- The Promise of Francis: The Man, the Pope and the Challenge of Change, by David Willey, 2014
Notable CD Album Covers
- Yma Sumac, Mambo Confusion, 1988.
- Warner Bros. Records, Detour Over the Edge, 1990
- LaVern Baker, Live in Hollywood, 1991
- Anita O’Day, At Vine St. Live, 1991
- Warner Bros. Records, Fluid Formations, 1991
- Warner Bros. Records, Cue It Up!, 1992
- Maxine Sullivan, Vine St. Live, 1992.
- Ruth Brown, Songs of My Life, 1993
- Benny Carter, Legends, 1993
- Hadda Brooks, Anytime, Anyplace, Anywhere, 1994
∙ Dorothy Donegan, At the Embers Live! 2020
Selected Exhibitions
- “Electroworks,” Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum, New York, 1980
- “Electroworks,” School of Image Arts, Ryerson University, Toronto, 1981
- “Divine Architecture,” Solo exhibition, Photo Impact Gallery, Hollywood, 1992.
- Todd Kaplan Gallery, Los Angeles, 1994.
- Modern Living Gallery, Los Angeles, 1996.
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