Kyle Hackett earned his M.F.A. in Painting from the LeRoy E. Hoffberger School of Painting at Maryland Institute College of Art and his B.F.A. in Fine Arts as a McNair Scholar from the University of Delaware. His paintings explore race, class and social standing through approaches to self-representation and the constructed image.

Hackett has received numerous honors and awards, including DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities Artist Fellowship and Grant, Civil Society Institute Fellowship at Vermont Studio Center Residency, The Ruth Katzman Scholarship at The League Residency, Best in Show at the 2014 Bethesda Painting Awards Exhibition, and Best in Show at the Regional Juried Biennial at Rehoboth Arts League. He was a semifinalist in the 2016 and 2019 BP Portrait Award (London) and Honorable Mention in the 2019 Art Olympia International Open Art Competition (Tokyo).

Hackett’s work has been published in New American Paintings, the Washington Post, and distinguished as "Ten Memorable Paintings of 2014" in the Huffington Post. He received A Mayoral Salute for his solo exhibition and artist talk at Baltimore City Hall Gallery. Hackett’s work is represented by Goya Contemporary Gallery (Baltimore, Md.) and notably collected by Ethan Cohen Gallery (New York), Wangechi Mutu Studio, University Museums at University of Delaware, University of Maryland and the Trawick Foundation.