Tight Fit, 2019

In Tight Fit, artist Devlin Shea extends her exploration of the everyday vignettes she observes and internalises—fleeting encounters that carry disproportionate emotional weight.

As in her paintings, the composition centres on an intimate moment between figures, intensified through close cropping. The frame presses in, compressing space and heightening the tension between bodies. Gestures feel charged, suspended between connection and discomfort.

Devlin Shea builds the image through layered fragments that accumulate across the surface. Rather than presenting a single, fixed scene, the composition feels assembled—as if memory itself were being reconstructed in real time. The viewer is invited to navigate these overlapping elements, piecing together the emotional logic of the encounter.

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.

Tight Fit 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.