Helen Wells Multimedia Artist
I am a multimedia artist layering hand drawn animation, film, text, soundscape and performance to create work that has both personal significance and a connection to society and earth in which we live.
My work often starts with something that disturbs me: my ageing body, experiences of isolation, changing abilities, the earth and the environment.
I love to take that disturbance as a starting point and then read and research, follow what interests me, make drawings and animations, film and slowly let the piece of work emerge.
Sometimes words come and a performance develops.
Sometimes I work alone and sometimes have great pleasure in working in groups where new and unexpected things emerge and new skills are learnt.
2015-2019 I worked with Creative Working Lives creating a project each year giving voice to experiences of change in society.
In 2021 I launched Before I Go Theatre Company which creates new work on themes of environmental and social justice and celebrates an ageless theatre.
Education
1983-91
Open University BA Hons First Class
1993-94
Post Graduate Diploma in Art Psychotherapy University of Hertfordshire
2003-2008 Post graduate Diploma in Process Oriented Psychology
2007 Film Making Cinema City/ Norwich Arts Centre
2015 London Film School Directing Summer School
2019 Directors Masterclass Cinema City Norwich
Residencies
2019 BLOC LAB residency Lowestoft
2020 Wild Wander with Glass House Dance
Exhibitions, Performance, Theatre
2023 Total Ensemble Project, Gorleston
My Name Means Light, Yare Gallery Great Yarmouth
RSC Julius Ceasar
The Welkin, Sewell Barn Theatre
Sounding the Elements Film with Anam Cora
The Mysteries Norwich Arts Centre
Requiem
Creative Community St. Stephens
Sensitive Indicator
North Star
2022 Shakespeare Nation Henry VI: Rebellion RSC Stratford on Avon
Carnival of Errors Stage 2 Norwich Theatre
Rights of the River , Wensum Park, Norwich
The Welkin, Sewell Barn Theatre
Inside Outside, St. Stephens Church Norwich
Prima Donna Festival with Glass House Dance
Shouting Into the Void, Theatre Royal Long Bar
2021 Celebrating Nature Norwich Fringe Arts Festival
Celebrating Nature 2 Transitions, Undercroft, Norwich
Well of Deep Waters, St. Margarets Church, Norwich
After the Storm, St. Stephens Church, Norwich
Rebel Rabble with Limbik Theatre
Performance:Too Much To Say Before I Go
Garage Theatre, Norwich
2020
Sky and Bones, Anteros Arts Foundation, Norwich
2019
Coasting, Skippings Gallery, Great Yarmouth
2019
Creative Working Lives Reimagine, St. Margarets Church of Art Norwich
2019
Dying Back and New Shoots, Anteros Arts Foundation, Norwich
2018
Ecstacy, Lower Green, Norwich
2018
H20 Undercroft Gallery Norwich