Legrady was born in Budapest, Hungary, and emigrated to Montreal, Quebec, Canada at age 6 with his parents and brothers Miklos and Thomas under political refugee status in November 1956 during the Hungarian Revolution.

Between the age of fourteen to twenty, he worked in construction, factories, and underground mining in northern Manitoba, also as a keyboardist in various Montreal bands such as the Mike Jones Group, the Haunted, and the Urge.

Following graduate studies at the San Francisco Art Institute in the mid 1970s, his work resulted in numerous projects that focused on a semiotic analysis of the photographic image.

[1][2] His most significant interactive digital media arts projects include the "Anecdoted Archive from the Cold War" in 1993, "Slippery Traces" in 1995, published by the ZKM Museum in Karlsruhe.

Commissioned by the Centre Pompidou and travelling internationally from 2001 to 2006, the data collecting installation "Pockets Full of Memories" invited visitors to contribute objects in their possession, digitally scanning and describing them.

Legrady has lectured internationally, including in the Revue virtuelle program at the Centre Pompidou with philosopher Pierre Levy and media artist Nam June Paik, and also in the Video Viewpoints series at the Museum of Modern Art.