Description

Seven Days Underwater – Original Underwater Oil Painting

What if you could capture seven days of underwater adventures in a single painting?

Seven Days Underwater is the largest original underwater painting created by Olga Nikitina, measuring 120 × 80 cm. This exceptional artwork tells the story of a seven-day scuba diving expedition in the Red Sea aboard the liveaboard vessel Heaven Saphir. More than a painting, it is a visual diary of an extraordinary journey through some of the Red Sea’s most spectacular underwater locations.

As a scuba diving instructor and underwater artist, I find my greatest inspiration beneath the ocean’s surface. Every dive is an opportunity to discover another world, experience unfamiliar colors and shapes, and observe the extraordinary diversity of marine life. I believe that learning to dive opens the door to a completely different reality — a world where weightlessness, changing light, and encounters with marine creatures transform the way we perceive our surroundings.During these seven days, I held several underwater painting sessions at different dive locations, capturing the impressions and emotions of the expedition. The journey included some of the Red Sea’s most iconic diving destinations: the famous Abu Nuhas shipwrecks, Ras Mohammed National Park, the legendary SS Thistlegorm wreck, the Brothers Islands, and the Salem Express wreck.

Each location offered a different atmosphere, colors, textures, and underwater experiences. Rather than creating separate documentary images of every dive, I wanted to bring these impressions together into one expressive composition — a collective memory of seven days spent exploring the underwater world.

What makes this artwork particularly special is its collaborative nature. At the end of the expedition, the members of the dive team who shared this adventure were invited to contribute their own touches to the painting. Everyone who participated became part of its creation, turning the artwork into a shared memory of the journey. It is a celebration not only of the underwater world but also of the friendships and experiences that bring people together through diving.

Created using oil paint on stretched cotton canvas, the original underwater painting features expressive impasto and bold palette-knife strokes. My approach, which I call Underwater Impressionism, is based on intuitive painting and emotional impressions experienced beneath the surface. I allow the underwater environment to influence my colours, movements, and composition, translating the sensations of weightlessness, changing light, and visual discovery into layers of textured paint.

Seven Days Underwater was exhibited at Spectrum Miami during the Art Festival as part of the ArtBox Project, bringing this unique underwater art experience to an international audience.

For me, scuba diving is not simply a sport or a way to explore beautiful places. It is an experience that changes your perception of the world. Once you have discovered this other reality, it stays with you. Through my paintings, I want to bring those memories back to the surface and allow viewers to reconnect with the emotions they experienced underwater — even if they have never dived before.

This large-scale original artwork makes a distinctive statement in a contemporary interior, art collection, or space inspired by travel and the ocean. It is an especially meaningful piece for scuba divers, ocean lovers, and collectors interested in experimental contemporary art.

Artwork Details

• Artist: Olga Nikitina
• Title: Seven Days Underwater
• Medium: Oil on stretched cotton canvas
• Size: 120 × 80 cm
• Series: Underwater Painting Project
• Style: Underwater Impressionism
• Technique: Expressive impasto and palette-knife painting
• Creation: Multiple underwater painting sessions during a seven-day Red Sea expedition
• Location: Red Sea, Egypt
• Expedition: Heaven Saphir liveaboard
• Special Feature: Collaborative artwork with contributions from the expedition dive team
• Exhibition: Spectrum Miami, ArtBox Project

Shipping

The original painting is professionally packaged in a protective shipping box and dispatched by express courier with tracking information.

Seven Days Underwater is more than a painting of the ocean. It is seven days of exploration, shared experiences, and unforgettable underwater memories brought together in one original artwork.