Helen Hockin has lived and worked in Lewes for over 30 years. She trained in Fine Art at Bath Academy of Art and has been trying to shake off some of that formal training ever since.

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In the early 1990s she co-founded the “Oakleaf Exhibition Space” in Lewes with the ceramicist Jo Hall. Helen has exhibited widely in Sussex, in Lewes, Worthing, Brighton and Ashdown Forest, and also in Bath and at the Lancaster Institute for the Contemporary Arts.

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In 2012 Helen was part of “Rites and Sites”, creating the “future archaeology” component of the “Witches 400” commemorative project in Lancashire. This project brought to life the story of the Pendle Witches; other contributors included poet Simon Armitage and writer Jeanette Winterson. A selection of Helen’s artworks from the project are now on permanent display at the Museum of Witchcraft in Boscastle, Cornwall.

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Her materials are varied, from natural and found objects to wax, string and more conventional drawing media. She creates her artwork from her photographs of china dolls, nature, and sculptures she originally made for her “Museum of Curiosity” – an intricate installation developed whilst working at Zu Studios in Lewes. This exhibition is a bringing together of her many artistic fields, this is the first showing of these new artworks that Helen has created over the past four years.

 

“Much of my artwork is based on nature, the spirit of folk tales and our cultural relationships with our amazing and varied landscape - the deeper, unseen history of its people.”