[1][2] She grew up in New York City, where she learned about experimental film through attending programs with her father at the Museum of Modern Art.
[3] Halpern trained as a dancer and joined the Lynda Gudde Dance Company, studying under Anna Sokolow and Meredith Baylis.
She co-founded the Collective for Living Cinema in 1972 and was involved with Ken and Flo Jacobs' New York Apparition Theatre.
[4] Halpern and her husband David Lebrun created the production company Night Fire Films, for documentary and animated works.
She worked closely with the Single Wing Turquoise Bird light show, originally established by Lebrun in the 1960s.