6 Years of Painting the Ocean: The Story Behind My Underwater Collection

Six years ago today, I registered my website.

At the time, it felt like a small step. Just a quiet decision to take something I loved, something I had rediscovered during a strange and uncertain time, and see where it might lead.

I didn’t have a clear plan.
No big strategy.
Just a feeling that I needed to follow it.

Looking back now, it’s hard to believe how much that one decision has shaped my life.

Before this, I spent 20 years in fashion.

For a long time, I thought that was a completely separate chapter of my life - something I had stepped away from.

But over time, I’ve realised it never really left.

It’s there in everything I do now. In the materials I use. In my love of texture. In the way I build each piece, layer by layer.

Without even noticing at first, I started bringing fabric into my work - reclaimed denim, vintage textiles, pieces of material that already held a story of their own.

It wasn’t planned. It just felt natural.

Most of my work has always been shaped by the shoreline.

That meeting point between land and sea. Movement and stillness. Structure and fluidity.

But over the past few months, something shifted.

I found myself drawn not to the edge of the water…but to what lies beneath it.

That feeling of being submerged. Weightless. Quiet.

Completely immersed in the moment.

To mark 6 years, I created a new body of work: The Underwater Collection: Beneath the Surface

A series of 6 original paintings exploring that space beneath the water. Each piece captures a different moment within it -

The way light breaks and scatters. The deeper, more textured layers below. The contrast between energy and stillness.

Some feel bright and full of movement. Others are quieter, more reflective.

Together, they form something I didn’t set out to create - but now feels like a natural evolution of my work.

This collection feels like a marker.

Not just of time passing, but of growth, change, and learning to trust the process, even when it doesn’t make sense at the time.

There have been moments over the past six years where things have felt uncertain. Where I’ve questioned the direction, or wondered if I was doing the right thing.

But I keep coming back to the same place - that instinct to create, to explore, to follow what feels true.

If you’ve followed my work, supported it, or connected with it in any way over the past six years - thank you.

It means more than I can properly put into words.

And if something in this new collection resonates with you, I hope you feel that same sense of connection to the ocean that inspired it.

You can view the full collection here:

https://www.gemmalessinger.com/the-underwater-collection

Gemma

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