Helena Cleeve

About Helena Cleeve

Helena Cleeve is a researcher and substitute senior lecturer in theory of science at the department of philosophy, linguistics and theory of science. She earned her PhD in 2020 at the Department of Neurobiology, Care Sciences and Society at Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, and has previously held a postdoctoral position at the Department of Sociology and Work Science at the University of Gothenburg.

Cleeve has a background in design, holding a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Industrial Design from Lund University (2011) and a Master of Fine Arts in Transdisciplinary Design from Parsons The New School for Design in New York. As an interdisciplinary researcher, she draws on her artistic background to develop visual methods in care research. Her theoretical and methodological approach is grounded in care studies, science and technology studies (STS), posthumanism, and visual studies.

Cleeve’s research focuses on care practices, particularly in relation to living with dementia. She currently leads the artistic research project Visions of Care – Drawing as a Way of Seeing the Relationship Between What Is Visualised and What Is Valued in Home Care, funded by the Swedish Research Council. The project is conducted in collaboration with Associate Professor Doris Lydahl and artist-researcher Danica Knezevic, based in Australia.

Her previous research has explored how staff work in dementia care units, as well as the role of everyday material objects in palliative and dementia care.

Cleeve’s work has been published in journals such as Medical Anthropology, Sociology of Health and Illness, Design and Culture, and Qualitative Research. She also works with illustration and graphic design in relation to research. Her illustrations have been published in the Nordic Journal of Science and Technology Studies and in the anthology A Kaleidoscope of Knowledge by the Young Academy of Sweden.