Helen Sargeant artist

Woman UP! Podcast by Desperate Artwives

Jul 9, 2020

I am a member of the Desperate Artwives an arts collective set up by Amy Dignam. In 2019 I was invited to record a podcast for Women Up! and was interviewed by Susan Merrick.

featured / News / Projects / Publications

Maternal Art Magazine – MAM a new publication created at home during lockdown

Jul 3, 2020

Maternal Art Magazine – MAM is a new art magazine focusing on artists from around the world producing work about the maternal. The first issue, Stay At Home due out in June 2020 is a response by 24 artists to their experiences of working at home during the COVID-19 pandemic. The magazine aims...

featured / Publications

Mother / Daughter

Jun 6, 2020

Mother/Daughter is a book that has been created through mobile phone text conversations with Helen’s mother. Helen wanted to create a book that documented and recorded her mothers prenatal and birth experiences.

Art / Drawing / featured / Projects / Workshops

Helen Sargeant – Maternal Journal

Jun 4, 2019

I had a go at the Maternal Journal guides and they are so much fun, I highly recommend you try them out too and they are all FREE to access online.

Drawing

Womb Room Tomb

Jun 1, 2019

Thinking of my pre-menopausal body and how this has had an affect on my emotions. A sense of loss, sadness, change, fear of the future and how to fill my time as the children grow more independent.

Workshops

Maternal Journal Todmorden & Hebden Bridge

Jun 1, 2019

Maternal Journal involves a series of creative workshops that explore the history and practice of journaling and the potential to promote positive mental health and wellbeing.

Drawing / featured / News / Projects

Maternal Journal Guide

May 3, 2019

I have created a free downloadable journaling template - "Mark making to capture connection between mother and baby" for the award winning Maternal Journal project produced by artist and midwife Laura Godfrey Isaacs.

Drawing / News / Publications / Workshops

Body Image & Self Portraits at Hoot

May 1, 2019

In the autumn term of 2018 I worked at Hoot in huddersfield facilitating a series of workshops about self portraiture fusing drawing and mixed media to help promote mental health and wellbeing. This interview was published via the Hoot blog as part of Mental Health Awareness Week. Body Image &...

Exhibitions / News

The M Word

May 1, 2019

‘The M word’ exhibition curated by Amy Dignam of Desperate Art Wives. A group exhibition of visual and material representation of concepts that revolve around the maternal experience, motherhood and maternal mental health.

Drawing

She was pregnant: mobile phone drawings

Jan 24, 2019

A series of drawings made using my my mobile phone. Playing with ideas and concepts to express a range of feelings in relation to the state of being pregnant.

featured / Video

A Silent Earthquake

Sep 11, 2017

https://vimeo.com/216138415 A film going back in time to when I became a mother and was dealing with post-natal depression.

Workshops

The Creative Birth Programme: BODY

Sep 7, 2017

I was invited to deliver a drawing workshop for pregnant women about the visualisation of the pregnant body as part of the Creative Birth Programme. The workshop involved exploring the pregnant body through dance, yoga and drawing. I worked in collaboration with midwife, artist, activist Laura Godfrey Isaac; and yoga teacher...

featured / News / Performance / Projects / Publications

PLAY AWAY

Aug 5, 2017

Ten Days at The Mothership, a collaborative arts residency by Helen Sargeant & Naoise Sargeant July 27th- 5th August 2017, Dorset, UK In the summer me and my youngest son Naoise (aged 8) spent 10 days at The Mothership, a beautiful straw bale live/work studio deep in the Dorset countryside....

Performance

Readings from M(other) & Son

Oct 30, 2016

Readings from M(other) & Son, performed at We Are Resident Exhibition, Islington Mill Project Space, Sunday 30th October 2016.

featured / Projects

M(other) & Son: arts residency to Finland blog

Sep 15, 2016

In September 2016 me and my son spent 14 days as artists in residence at Takahuhti Artcenter, Tampere, Finland, supported by Nicola Smith’s We Are Resident project and funded by the Arts Council. I posted writing and images each day throughout the duration of our residency on the M(other) & Son blog.

featured / Performance / Projects / Publications

M(other) & Son

Sep 15, 2016

A two week collaborative research residency between Helen Sargeant and her son Naoise Sargeant at Takahuhti Artcenter, Tampere, Finland, supported by Nicola Smith’s We Are Resident project and funded by the Arts Council. In September 2016 I spent two weeks with my youngest son Naoise (age 7) taking part in a collaborative arts residency to...

Drawing

M(other) & Son: Finland smart phone drawings

Sep 12, 2016

Drawings made in collaboration with my youngest son on my smart phone during the M(other) & Son residency to Tampere, Finland.

Drawing

Mummy’s Tummy

Sep 2, 2016

Me and my youngest son Naoise (aged six) played a drawing game in a book. He drew babies in the tummy’s of my mummy’s and I drew babies in the tummy’s of his mummy’s.

featured / Performance / Workshops

Dust to Bread

May 10, 2016

A participatory arts project delivered on behalf of Artist As Mother As Artist, an Arts Council funded exhibition curated by Tracey Kershaw and Sam Rose. I worked together with the curators and two groups of parents, their children and a group of women to bake bread from the dust in...

Drawing

M(other) & Sons

Mar 12, 2016

A series that plays with making collaborative composite drawings by me and my two sons. I bring together opposing elements, marks, motifs and characters from each of our drawing practices to explore my own maternal identity and the relationship my children hold with me.

Drawing / Performance / Photography

Playground drawings

Feb 16, 2016

The line that begins a journey, a game, play. You encourage me to follow and trace the lines that you have made. I twist and turn on your line. We laugh together. The line that connects me to you. An umbilical line.

Drawing

The fountain

Feb 1, 2016

A series of drawings about the female body produced throughout the autumn of 2015. Thinking about the body as container, lactation, sexuality, fertility. Abundant milk and being drained of milk. The cervix opening and closing. Connectivity.

Performance / Photography

Self Portraits as Mother

Jan 30, 2016

A series of photographic self portraits that attempt an alternative view to idealised images of mother.

featured / News / Video

Ma Ma/ Boo Boo

Apr 7, 2015

The film utilises 215 intimate family photographs and home video footage taken by the artist, together with autobiographical prose that weaves a journey through Helen's thoughts, feelings and experiences of breastfeeding.

Photography / Projects

M(other) Stories

Jan 5, 2015

"Autobiographical writing is juxtaposed with photographs taken at home and during the school run using my smart phone camera. Photographs record the ever shifting, transitory time I share with my family. There are shadow portraits of me and my son playing, of my son sleeping, intimate observations of his body...

Drawing / featured

Her Family

Sep 15, 2014

Playing with embedding my children's drawings into my own, thinking about the body of the mother and the child, gender, sexuality, nurture and protection.

Projects

The egg, the womb the head and the moon

May 6, 2014

“The egg, the womb, the head and the moon” www.eggwombheadmoon.com, has been created to show existing work and research-driven practice about the maternal by the Mewe arts collective in response to the title. The site includes documentation of visual art work, video, sound, performance and texts by members of Mewe, including contextual dialogue...

Latest entries

Video

The Consultation

Sep 25, 2004

The Consulation depicts Sargeant manipulating a child's cuddly toy and enacting a visit to the doctors

Video

Cat in a bag

Jul 25, 2004

A womans' hand repetitively squeezes a sound box of a cat meowing from inside a children's soft toy.

Uncategorized / Workshops

The goddess with her hands full

Jun 19, 2004

A stop motion animation re-telling the story of Rama and Kali. Made by Helen Sargeant in collaboration with St Josephs Primary School, Wythenshawe. Funded by Artists and Education together with Creative Partnerships Salford and Manchester.

Uncategorized / Workshops

Albert and the Lion

May 22, 2004

A stop motion animation of Albert and the Lion. Made in collaboration with Helen Sargeant and the children of Turton High School, Bolton. Funded by Artists and Education for the Step Up festival, Manchester.

Video

Birdie

Aug 25, 2003

A puppet mother bird feeds her puppet chicks in a privet hedge.

Video

Land poem song

May 25, 2003

Sargeant sings a version of Aretha Franklins’ I say a little prayer. A song of loss set in a suburban landscape. A woman’s identity disintegrates into her environment as she reflects upon a failed relationship.

Projects

Lancaster Moor Hospital

Jun 14, 1998

"In 1998 I completed a 5 month collaborative residency at the hospital with Michael Mayhew (performance artist), and Scott Abraham (film maker). Based on the Conniston Ward we worked together to produce an interdisciplinary installation and performance piece. |"

Exhibitions

Scenes from the Asylum Wall

Jun 29, 1997

"A performance installation produced as the result of a collaborative residency by Helen Sargeant (Visual Artist), Michael Mayhew (Performance Artist) and Scott Abraham (Film Maker) at the John Moore Hospital, Lancashire prior to its closure in 1997."