Description
DOCUMENTATION OF WORKSHOP INSTALLATION PERFORMANCE
CIRCLE OF LIGHT –
LIVING YOUR VALUES
A creative day workshop with Lorna Carmen McNeill
Most recently run in Kidderminster, UK 6/4/26 for Quaker Junior Yearly Meeting, 50 young people aged 14-18
Circle of Light – Living Your Values is an immersive creative workshop exploring how the things that matter most to us can be expressed visually through colour, shape, form and light.
The day begins with a brief gentle grounding and breathing exercise followed by a reflective process, creating space for participants to arrive, connect with themselves and consider the question:
What values matter most to me, and how do I live them in the world?
Through guided reflection and creative exploration, participants identify a value or quality that is important to them — such as peace, courage, compassion, freedom, hope or belonging — and explore how this might be translated into a personal visual language.
Participants are shown how to explore what colour, shape and texture their chosen value embodies and are supported to create an individual transparent artwork using glass paint that expresses something meaningful about themselves and their values. They are then invited to consider what changes in their life would need to happen to live their values.
The individual works then become part of a larger collective experience. Towards the end of the workshop, when it is dark, the group comes together to create a Circle of Light, illuminating their individual artworks so that colours and forms overlap and interact.
This creates a powerful visual metaphor: each person brings something unique, yet together the individual contributions create something that could not exist alone.
The workshop explores themes including:
- Personal values and identity
- Creativity as a form of self-expression
- Belonging and connection
- The relationship between individuality and community
- How we can live our values in a divided world
- Peace, hope and collective imagination
The final Circle of Light provides a shared moment of reflection and celebration, inviting participants to experience how different perspectives, values and expressions can coexist and create something beautiful together.
The workshop is suitable for young people and adults and can be adapted for different groups, communities and contexts. No previous artistic experience is necessary.
Suggested format
A full-day workshop (approximately 5–6 hours)
The day allows time for:
- Arrival and grounding
- Guided reflection and discussion
- Exploring personal values and how life would be different if these were fully lived.
- Individual creative development
- A shared break
- Completion of individual artworks
- Creating the collective Circle of Light
- Group reflection and closing
The workshop can also be adapted to connect with particular themes relevant to the host organisation, community or event.
The overall experience combines creativity, reflection, transformation and participation, culminating in a visually striking collective artwork and a meaningful shared experience of connection and belonging
