海倫•查德維克1953年生於倫敦南部的克羅伊登，1973-6年就讀布萊頓理工學院，1976-7年入讀倫敦切爾西藝術學院。她以原創而極度個人化的方式演繹當代藝術，以自己的身體作為創作主題和描繪對象。與她同期的藝術家，很少能像她如此獨特地運用現代科技，如影印機、投影機、大型寶麗萊照相機、電腦和顯微鏡來創作。離開藝術學院後，她開始參照自己身體的各部位，製成軟性而有機的雕塑，更將雕塑作品轉化為現場表演，直接而真切地演繹出來。早期的自傳式作品，表現她由出生至成人的發展過程。後期較複雜的裝置作品，則把她身體的影印本與大量有機形體結合，強調身體感官的享受和短暫性的歡愉。
查德維克的作品時常對物理上或是文化上的「界限」提出質疑。她通過電腦，把細胞結構圖與天然海岸線重疊，製作了一系列「病毒景觀」攝影作品。她後期又用寶麗萊相機製成系列作品《肉的抽象》（1989），表現對內臟器官的形態、功能的迷戀和審視態度。查德維克因先天性心臟病而英年早逝，《致歡愉的花圈》系列是她臨終前的作品之一。整個系列有十三幅圓形彩色照片，描繪一束束花朵放置於家用化學液之中，作品將各樣有機與有毒，或流動與靜態，或清潔與骯髒的物質混雜融合，並糅合了藝術與科技元素。圓形碟子使人聯想到實驗室中的培養皿，寓意文化可以被培養。
查德維克於1987年獲「特納獎」提名，1994年在倫敦蛇形畫廊舉行個展，大獲好評，展出作品包括沸騰的巧克力噴泉《可可》，以及與夥伴在雪地上撒尿，形成孔洞後倒模鑄成的雕塑《小便之花》；同年參加聖保羅雙年展。查德維克於1996年逝世。
Helen Chadwick was born in Croydon, south London in 1953, and studied at Brighton Polytechnic from 1973-6 and Chelsea School of Art in London from 1976-7. Her contribution to contemporary art was original and intensely personal, characterised by the use of her own body as both subject and object. Few artists at the time embraced the means of modern technology— the photocopier, light projection, large format Polaroid camera, computer and microscope— in such a distinctive way. After leaving art school she began to make soft, organic objects based on parts of her body. Direct and intimate, she translated these sculptures into live performances. Early autobiographical works depicted her development from birth to maturity. Later, more complex installations comprised photocopied images of her body suspended in a sea of organic forms, emphasising the sensuality and transience of physical pleasure.
A constant theme in much of Chadwick's work was the questioning of boundaries, both physical and cultural. A series of “viral landscape” photoworks involved a computer generation of Chadwick’s cellular structure overlaid onto images of the natural coastline. A later series using the Polaroid camera entitled Meat Abstracts (1989), presented the viscera of the body in an extraordinary examination of the function, form and fetish of internal organs. One of the last bodies of work Chadwick undertook, before her premature death from a congenital heart defect, was Wreath to Pleasure. The series consisted of thirteen circular cibachrome prints that combined elements of art and technology, mixing and merging the organic and toxic, fluid and static, clean and dirty, with clusters of flowers settling on the surface of various domestic fluids. The circular dish reminiscent of Petri suggested that a culture could be grown as well as acquired.
She was nominated for the Turner Prize in 1987 and had a widely acclaimed solo exhibition at the Serpentine Gallery, London in 1994 which included a fountain of hot bubbling chocolate, Cacao, and Piss Flowers, sculptures made by casting the holes left by Chadwick and her partner urinating in the snow. The same year her work was shown at the Bienal de São Paulo. Helen Chadwick died in 1996.