Lili Bernard, whose ancestry is Cuban-Jamaican-Spanish-Chinese-British, was born in Santiago de Cuba. When she was three, her family moved to the United States. At the age of sixteen, Lili moved with her family to Tokyo, where she co-starred on Japanese prime-time dramatic television and exposed her artwork in various exhibitions. Upon graduating from the American School in Japan; Lili entered the Bachelor of Fine Arts Program at Cornell University, where she also studied drama and German. Completing three years at Cornell; Lili left for New York City, where she trained in theatre under Sonia Moore and received a Bachelor of Arts degree in German from the City University of New York. While enjoying some success as a professional theatre and television actress in New York City and Los Angeles, Lili continued to avidly paint as well.

In drama, Lili's New York City theatre credits include performances at the Puerto-Rican Traveling Theatre Co., Nat Horne Theatre, INTAR, American Renaissance Theatre, Theatre for the New City, Henry Street Settlement, The Pearl Theatre, Cooper Square Theatre, Frank Silvera's Writers Workshop and Plays for Living. In Los Angeles, Lili was a cast member of UCLA Players Theatre Company. She also played the female lead, Maggie, in an all-Black stage production of "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof," at the Arena Theatre in Cal State LA. Lili has performed her own written dramatic works at CalArts, Brown University, Glendale Public Library and the 2010 Cuban Music Festival Los Angeles. In television, Lili guest-starred as the zany and very pregnant Mrs. Minifield on “The Cosby Show” and co-starred as Kramer’s Black girlfriend, Anna, on the sitcom, “Seinfeld." Variety commended Lili for her portrayal as Harlan's Nurse in the CBS TV miniseries, "Stephen King's Golden Years." Of Lili’s work as the female lead (opposite Ving Rhames and Eriq LaSalle) in the BBC film, "Murder in Oakland," critic Sean Day-Lewis wrote in London's Sunday Telegraph, "A nerve tuggingly effective performance by Lili Bernard, full of pain, guilt and fear.”

In her capacity as a fine artist: Lili’s paintings have been exhibited at the William Grant Still Center of the Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs, Ave 50 Studio in Los Angeles, Art Share Los Angeles, the Toyota National Headquarters, The Hayworth Theatre, Downtown Art Gallery, Glendale Central Library, Pico House Gallery at El Pueblo de Los Angeles Historical Monument, Gallery Western, Women's City Club of Pasadena, Phantom Galleries LA, Hollywood YMCA, St. Agatha’s Catholic Church and California Institute of the Arts (CalArts), where in 2009, for their Arts in the One World Conference, Lili had a solo exhibition of her paintings and premiered part of her work-in-progress entitled “Ceiba de Cuba.” Lili also presented Ceiba de Cuba as well as her infamous related Song of Che Chango at the Brown University AOW 2010 conference, the City of Glendale’s Man’s Inhumanity to Man 2010 Symposium, and the Cuban Music Festival 2010 in Echo Park, Los Angeles. Ceiba de Cuba is an onstage mergence of Lili’s artwork, poetry, playwriting and videography. In this fusion of paintings, performance art, spoken word, video, drama, dance and Afro-Cuban drums; Lili tells the story of life in Cuba and of Lili’s ancestors by weaving reality and fiction.

While an actress in New York City, Lili created and ran a mentoring program in her neighborhood of Harlem for disadvantage youth. In 1995, Lili married civil rights attorney Franklin Ferguson. The couple lives in Los Angeles with their six young children to whom Lili gave birth in a ten year span. In 2001, Lili founded and charted the nonprofit all-volunteer run youth organization, City of Angels Little League (CALL), which continues to successfully serve children in Los Angeles, California. Lili also serves as a long-term board member of the Parent Teacher Organization at her children's school.

In February of 2007, Lili opened her art studio on Chung King Road, which is the main strip of Chinatown Los Angeles' world renown art gallery district. As well as painting in her art studio, Lili also regularly hosts events there, such as book signings, live music and art performances, poetry readings, and artist discussions, all in an effort to support the work of her artist friends. In August of 2009, Lili opened the HABLA Underground in the basement gallery of her art studio. The gallery is an art exhibition space available for underrepresented artists of all ethnicities to independently and collectively show their work in a premiere art district. Artists rent portions of the Underground gallery, act as independent merchants and keep 100% of their sales.

Of her painting, Lili writes, “I paint, because I consider it my purpose under heaven, to help spread a little love through colors on canvas that celebrate my multi-cultural native Cuban heritage and impel me to express myself through poetry, libretto, drama and videography. I strive, through these mediums, to very personally share with others the spiritual and physical beauty found within the Afro-Caribbean Diaspora. Of her community-organizing and social-activism, Lili says, "I inherited that from my father's father, my Abuelo José. He was an idealist, a multi-linguist, a poet, an author, a painter, an evangelical pastor who founded his own Churches in the Caribbean, and a veteran of Cuba’s war of independence from Spain. My grandfather’s spirit is a big inspiration in my work.”