She photographed theatre, and then turned to a series of people and streetscapes, such as Garbage Collectors (1974), Berliner Kneipen (1975), Leipzig Hauptbahnhof (1981), self portraits, and houses and faces from Halle for an exhibition that was cancelled in 1986.

Her father and two brothers were still away, but in the meantime frontier changes mandated by the victorious powers and large-scale ethnic cleansing forced Helga's mother to flee with her two daughters.

She then studied fashion design at the School of Engineering for the Clothing Industry (Ingenieurschule für Bekleidungsindustrie) in Berlin until 1960.

[1] She was a costume designer at the Berliner Studenten- und Arbeitertheater, a theatre of students and workers, which introduced her to the artists' circle around Wolf Biermann.

[2] She had developed a passion for photography but, like many of the leading photographers of the German Democratic Republic (GDR), was often described as self-taught.

She was influenced by the work of Edvard Munch, Max Beckmann, Francis Bacon, and Werner Held.

[3] In 1972, she joined the Verband Bildender Künstler der DDR [de] association of visual artists, which was virtually a prerequisite for success in what was now her chosen career.

[1] In 1975, she photographed scenes from theatre productions by Benno Besson at the Berlin Volksbühne and by Alexander Lang and Friedo Solter [de] at the Deutsches Theater.

[6] In Halle, she encountered greater difficulty than in Berlin because the people she photographed were strangers who sometimes reacted with hostility.