Helga Paris, born in Goleniów (then Pomerania), came to Berlin in 1956 at the age of 18 to study fashion design. Here she gradually developed a greater interest in art. Starting in the mid-1960s, she taught herself the basics of photography, eventually photographing people in their surroundings or urban situations, often in series. She advanced to become a chronicler of her time with an interest in social milieus. Since 2011, she has not been active as a photographer because, in her own opinion, she considers her work finished