Stormy greys and glacial whites, godly shades of silver; dappled blues that ripple and dissolve into shadow and light. The ocean gives endlessly from its depths, its beauty refracted through the shifting theatre of the skies above. But can we ever truly capture the awe it inspires? The wild flare of coral, the flicker of gold in unseen trenches, the quiet, intricate perfection of a shell. There’s a delicacy to the ocean that I see shimmering in the fabric rolls of chiffon and satin, waiting to slip and swim about a woman’s body.

And yet, I do not belong to it. I am always aware of being out of my depth. My swimming is confined to the ponds of Hampstead, where even the brush of a passing reed against my ankle sends me hastening towards the reassurance of a lifebuoy. On holiday, I linger at the shoreline, barefoot and tentative, letting the water only lap at my feet.

STORMY GREYS & GLACIAL WHITES

I was born in Southampton, a port city shaped by the sea’s rhythms and its tragedies. My grandfather drowned; my father carried a quiet apprehension, an inherited respect for the sea’s power. The inherited memory of the Titanic disaster that rocked the city still lingered in my grandmother’s heart. I was never destined to be a surfer.

And yet, to stand beside the sea, to feel its force and witness its ceaseless transformation, is at once terrifying, beguiling, and deeply stirring. If I cannot inhabit it, I can at least translate it. Creatively, I dive deep, pulling inspiration like pearls, drawing from its starfish and anemones, its intricate flora and fauna. I take the crystalline purity of its Arctic hues and render them in luxurious fabrics, layering gossamer textures to evoke its glistening, fluid surface.

I shape faceted crystals into formations that recall submerged rocks and sculpt sinuous strands of glass beads that echo the rhythm of waves, cresting over the shoulder and cascading down the low back of a gown. In these gestures, I attempt to distil something of its essence, to bring the ocean’s language into form.

But however refined the interpretation, however evocative the result, it can never rival its source. The ocean, in all its vast, mercurial beauty, resists capture. It simply wins, every time.

This is how this short essay appears in the special Oceanographic publication, The Innerview