Her Palms, 2019

In Her Palms, artist Lucy Whitford brings together drawing and sculpture, layering imagery from her ceramic practice over the botanical study first developed in Alcea. The print stages a dialogue between flat surface and three-dimensional form, allowing one body of work to rest upon another.

Ceramic elements appear superimposed across the composition, their dense patterning derived from black-fired clay manipulated with marbled clay and porcelain. These textured surfaces interrupt the delicacy of the underlying drawing, creating a tension between organic growth and constructed form.

The work reflects Whitford’s broader approach: materials are tested against one another, boundaries between mediums are softened, and intuition guides structure. As in her sculptural installations, fragility and weight coexist, held in careful balance.

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.

Her Palms 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.