Hildegard Maria Helene Ochse (maiden name Römer) was born at home in Bad Salzuflen, Westphalia on December 7, 1935, the daughter of Dr. phil.
Her host father was employed by Eastman Kodak as a senior chemist in the development department and his knowledge of photography became an important influence for Hildegard.
In 1955 she passed her German high exams with honors and began studying romance languages and art history at the University of Freiburg in Breisgau with Dr. Hugo Friedrich (1904–1978) and Dr. Kurt Bauch (1897–1975), whose areas of research were among others Dutch painting and Rembrandt.
After an extended stay in France with the family in 1975, their marriage began to fail later leading to a final separation.
At the beginning of the workshop, a somewhat orthodox documentary way of seeing dominated, which organized itself around the aesthetics of Michael Schmidt and focused on a presentation of everyday life.
Her imagery developed soon after initial attempts—profound, multi-layered and philosophical, dense, highly concentrated, conceptual and documentary.
From 1978 Hildegard taught photography at the state media center,[3] as well as at the Pedagogical University Berlin and could present her images in galleries for the first time.
After the final separation from her husband and a private fresh start, she established herself as an independent author photographer as of 1981.