The work covers the arts of: painting, objects/sculpturing, installation.
Since the early 90s her painting has been based on the material beauty of simple fabrics. Her work frequently does not have its beginning in the subject itself, which is raised to dominate once the process has been completed; it is in the material. For about 15 years now the artist has been working with ash, which, as a pigment and as the surface of the material, is also used as a basic material for producing sculptures. Other materials, such as lead, wax and tempera/oil painting, are naturally also used. Since ash, lead and wax often claim for themselves strong symbolic value, the contents of the paintings often deal with the theme of transience, transition and change. In formal terms, however, it is the line drawn that is the focal point of many works. Graphisms, ornament and drawing as an artifact are neither reduced to a form which simply lacks content; nor do they become quite lost in graphic narration.

The paintings are accompanied by objects and sculptures, which frequently use "poor" materials. The sculptures are prompted by working with flat spaces, which frequently gives rise to serial plastics integrated in installations and stagings.

In the middle of the 90s Bärbel Hische started producing interior installations, with the intention of exploring, changing and restructuring space with artistic means. Dealing with the aspect of three-dimensionality gave the artist more space to make statements on questions of time, on current issues, and also on her own themes with other materials and with new possibilities, with an important aspect being working with the general public and involving people on the spot.