Festival of the Mind Blog 

What does it mean to live with complex emotions? And how do we communicate experiences that can be difficult to capture in words?

These are questions at the heart of the Complex Emotions Hub, a five-year UKRI-funded research programme seeking to better understand the experiences, needs, strengths and outcomes of people living with complex emotions.

They are also questions we have recently been exploring in a very different way – through clay.

Bringing together research, art and lived experience

In November 2026, the Complex Emotions Hub will be taking part in the University of Sheffield's Festival of the Mind, which brings together researchers and Sheffield-based artists to create new ways for the public to engage with research.

For our project, we are working with ceramic artist Angie Hardwick to develop a large-scale installation exploring the lived experience of complex emotions.

From the beginning, we wanted the project to reflect an important principle underpinning the Hub's research: there is no single experience of complex emotions.

The Complex Emotions Hub takes a transdiagnostic approach. This means our research is not limited to people with one particular diagnosis. Our cohort includes people with and without a diagnosis of borderline personality disorder or emotionally unstable personality disorder, as well as people whose experiences may overlap with other mental health conditions or who may not identify with a diagnostic label at all.

Our aim for the installation is therefore not to create a visual representation of a diagnosis or a list of symptoms. Instead, we want to explore the complexity, individuality and shared experiences that can exist across people's lives – including difficulties, strengths, relationships, identity, coping, creativity, connection and hope.

Starting with people's own experiences

Rather than asking an artist to interpret the research alone, we wanted people with lived experience to be directly involved in shaping what the final artwork might become.

Before the workshops, participants were invited to think creatively about three areas: words that described their experiences of complex emotions; positive characteristics, strengths and ways of coping; and images, poetry, symbols or artwork that might communicate something about their experiences.

There were no right answers and no expectations of artistic ability.

Nine members of the Complex Emotions Hub cohort then joined us for two workshops with Angie. In the first, participants worked with clay to create individual masks inspired by their own experiences. Some focused on a particular event or turning point that had shaped their lives. Others represented experiences across different periods of their lives, while some chose to foreground strengths and positive aspects of themselves that can easily be overlooked when conversations focus predominantly on difficulties.

The second workshop gave participants an opportunity to glaze and develop their pieces further.

The masks were never intended to become identical representations of "complex emotions". Their differences are precisely the point.

Finding another language for experience

One of the most striking aspects of the workshops was seeing what became possible when people were given a material, rather than a questionnaire or an interview question, through which to explore their experiences.

As one participant reflected:

"There's something very satisfying about moulding something physical to express thoughts, feelings and emotions."

They described how being creative alongside other research participants gave them "a sense of being part of something bigger" and how valuable it was to see other people's different interpretations of complex emotions.

Another participant similarly reflected:

"The project combined research with a creative process — it felt very different from anything I've done before, and it helped me express thoughts and feelings in a more visual and intuitive way."

For them, the process became unexpectedly emotional and reflective:

"I didn't expect that at the beginning."

These reflections have made us think more broadly about what engagement with research can look like. Research participation is often associated with completing measures, answering questions or taking part in interviews. These approaches are, of course, important. But engagement around research can also create opportunities for expression, connection and reflection that sit outside our conventional academic methods.

Creative processes may offer another language through which people can communicate experiences that are difficult to explain.

Creating a space for connection – and learning from what did not work for everyone

An important part of this project has also been listening to feedback about the experience of taking part.

One participant described the value of being alongside others who shared some understanding of complex emotions:

"It was nice to be in a space where I felt that people around me had an understanding of complex emotions and there was no judgement."

Future Learning 

A creative space that feels safe, supportive and connecting for one person may feel demanding or exposing for another. Saying that people will work "individually within a group" is not necessarily enough information for someone to understand what the physical and social environment will actually feel like.

If we were to run similar workshops again, we would think more carefully about explaining the room layout and level of expected interaction beforehand, making researcher and participant roles clearer, providing options for quieter or more individual working spaces, and allowing more flexibility around time.

Meaningful involvement is not only about inviting people into spaces we create. It is also about being willing to change those spaces based on what people tell us. 

From Nine Masks to a shared installation

The individual masks are now helping to inspire the next stage of the project.

Our current plan is for Angie to create eight life-sized ceramic heads, each drawing on different contributions from cohort participants, our Lived Experience Advisory Panel, the creative workshops and themes emerging from the wider research.

The heads will be individual, because people's lives and experiences are individual. But they will also be connected.

A series of ribbons will move between the heads, representing experiences and themes that can be shared across people while taking different forms in different lives. This reflects the transdiagnostic approach of the Complex Emotions Hub: there is no single diagnosis, symptom list or journey that can capture what it means to experience complex emotions.

Alongside the eight heads, we are also exploring the idea of a ninth space that invites visitors to consider their own experiences, perceptions and assumptions.

The installation is ultimately intended to raise awareness of complex emotions and challenge the stigma and misconceptions that can surround people who experience them. We want visitors to encounter people as complex human beings rather than as diagnoses or collections of symptoms – recognising difficulties while also making space for strengths, creativity, relationships, survival and hope.

Continuing the conversation

The creative workshops may have finished, but the process of developing the installation is continuing.

We will be working with Angie, members of our Lived Experience Advisory Panel and cohort participants to think about how the masks, artwork, poetry and ideas people have shared can be represented in the final exhibition. We are also considering carefully the words that will accompany and connect the artwork, and what we ultimately want visitors to think, feel or question when they encounter it.

One participant told us that taking part had made them feel grateful to contribute to "something bigger that connects creativity and research". They also suggested a future workshop using their own creative practice of making art with coffee – a lovely reminder that engagement can generate new ideas and relationships that extend beyond the activity we originally planned.

Perhaps that is one of the most valuable things we are learning from this project.

Research does not always have to begin with a form and end with a publication. Sometimes, creating opportunities to make, share, connect and reflect can open up entirely different conversations.

We are excited to see where those conversations – and the clay – take us next.

The completed installation will be exhibited as part of the University of Sheffield's Festival of the Mind in November 2026, with the exhibition free and open to the public.