Returning to Painting After 10 Years: From Blank Canvas to Seascape
- Marina Syntelis
- 2 days ago
- 4 min read
The Basement Where I Began Again
My return to painting after a break of almost a decade was a moment I will never forget. I remember standing in the basement of my home, a place with poor lighting, filled with storage boxes and all the things one might expect in an average family basement. In front of me stood an old, blank canvas, waiting for me to transform it into art.
I had placed it on my old easel, which had been stored for years in that very basement and I simply stood there looking at it, as if I was waiting for something to happen. After so many years away from painting, the distance between myself and that white surface felt larger than it should have been.
And then the question appeared almost immediately.
Now what?
Many fellow artists know this feeling well. It is often called blank canvas stress—that strange moment when the possibilities feel so endless that beginning becomes difficult, sometimes even overwhelming.
When Experience Alone Was Not Enough
What unsettled me in that moment was not only insecurity about technique, but mainly uncertainty about meaning. Technically, my experience with oils was limited anyway, as I had spent the final years of my studies working with 3D installations. However, I had learned that art has more to do with perception than medium. I knew that, sooner or later, I would handle the technique.
But what would my work be about?
Instead of searching for inspiration or waiting for clarity, I made a smaller, more manageable decision: I would simply begin. Inspiration does not strike like a lightning bolt. It is born through the process. This is where my prior experience proved valuable.
Creating My Own Window
The basement had almost no windows. The only openings were a few small ventilation windows high near the ceiling, far above eye level. If I had intentionally chosen a studio space, a basement like this would probably have been my last choice. Yet, that limitation slowly began to suggest a possibility.
Standing there day after day, looking at the blank canvas, I started to notice its shape differently. The rectangular surface began to resemble the window I wished the room had.
If the space around me could not offer a view, perhaps the painting itself could become one. Instead of waiting for the outside world to inspire me, I could create the view I longed to see.
So I picked up the brushes that had remained untouched for years and opened the six tubes of oil paint that had somehow survived time, trying to concentrate.
The First Brushstroke
The first image that came naturally to me was a view of Santorini, my mother’s birthplace; a landscape of light, open horizons, and the distinct blue of the Aegean Sea.
Once the first brushstroke touched the canvas, it was no longer blank. The story had begun to unfold. Before I even realized it, the basic idea was there. An observer might not have distinguished much at that point, but it did not matter to me. I could already see the story within those vague lines of blue.
It felt almost like opening a window in that closed room.
After that first painting, I continued working on similar views and began placing them one by one along the basement walls. Slowly, the atmosphere of the space started to transform. What had once been bare walls and storage boxes gradually filled with openings toward distant horizons. Even the air seemed to change.
Little by little, I stopped paying attention to the room itself. It had become my studio.
When the Sea Remained
Over time, the paintings began to change. The buildings became less important and gradually disappeared. What remained was the sea.
Although I was working from photographs, I later realized that I was choosing them based more on emotion than composition. The sea I painted reflected how I felt—sometimes calm, sometimes more intense—moving between realism and abstraction.
The Window Began to Reflect Back
At some point, I realized that the paintings had stopped being simple views.
I had begun by creating windows toward landscapes I missed, yet gradually those windows started reflecting something back to me. Without consciously planning it, the works had become deeply personal.
Each painting began to capture a particular thought, a specific mood, or a quiet season of my life.
Looking at them now, I can still recall the decisions behind every brushstroke, every adjustment of color, every hesitation, and every moment of certainty that accompanied their creation.
In that sense, my seascape paintings became something like a visual diary.
The Blank Canvas Still Asks the Same Question
Even today, when I begin a new painting, the memory of that first uncertain return remains close to me. The blank canvas still asks its quiet question:
Now what?
Over time, I have come to understand that uncertainty is not an obstacle to creativity. It is part of the process of creating work that is personal and sincere.
I no longer begin a painting unless there is at least one honest reason behind it—sometimes emotional, sometimes technical—because without that inner necessity, the work feels empty.
The sea continues to appear in my work not because I have fully understood it, but because it offers a space wide enough to hold doubt, memory, movement and change.
What began as a simple attempt to overcome that initial hesitation eventually became a body of seascape paintings, each one reflecting a moment of an ongoing path.
Thank you for reading and for sharing this small part of my journey.
If you feel curious, you are welcome to explore the works that grew from it. It is my quiet hope that somewhere among these paintings, you might find a window of your own.
Until next tide🌊
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