And Her Heart Fell Out of Her Mouth, 2019

For Ellipsis Prints, artist Bea Bonafini produced two limited edition Risograph prints centred on the image of a ceramic bird in ascent and descent. The soaring bird, drawn from her sculptural practice, becomes the focal point of the composition.

In her ceramic works, these birds are formed through the marbling of mixed clays, vulcan stoneware and coloured porcelain, creating intricate surface patterning. In the Risograph translation, that material complexity is reinterpreted through layered colour and fragmentation. The bird’s form is subtly broken apart and reassembled, complicating its reading and resisting symbolic certainty.

Long associated with spiritual transformation and transcendence, the bird in Bea Bonafini’s work is neither purely mythic nor purely decorative. Instead, it hovers between states: elevation and gravity, cohesion and dispersal, echoing the fluidity and chromatic harmony that characterise her wider mixed-media practice.

In risograph printing, each colour is printed as a separate pass through a risograph machine — a stencil-based duplicator that presses organic soy inks into the paper. Risograph inks are naturally vibrant — they are renowned for their vivid colours and evident textures. The inks are transparent so layers build to create more colours. Slight shifts in registration and a soft grain make every impression subtly unique.

And Her Heart Fell Out of Her Mouth is printed on Olin natural white 170gsm, an uncoated, FSC-certified stock whose gentle warmth lets the colours glow. The edition is strictly limited to 100 and will never be reprinted. All prints were produced at the London Centre for Book Arts.