What is Submerged Studio?

Submerged Studio is a family-run art studio built around original artwork, experimentation, and a lifelong fascination with fantasy.

The studio started with work by professional artist Jessica Douglas, then expanded into artwork and creative projects from other members of the studio family. Their creativity ranges from traditional painting and illustration to mixed media, sculptural elements, beadwork, paper construction, and other techniques that blur the line between two-dimensional and three-dimensional art.

Then they leap into odd things like flint knapping and insect taxidermy.

A Studio Built on Exploration

There is no single medium that defines Submerged Studio. Watercolor, gouache, acrylic, colored pencil, handmade papers, gemstones, beads, sculpted elements, and found materials may all make unexpected appearances.

Sometimes a piece begins with a carefully planned technique. Other times, it begins with a question: What happens if we try this?

The joy of exploration and creating is what it’s all about.

Fantasy, Curiosity, and Unexpected Directions

When it comes to fantasy, dragons, strange creatures, mythological figures, tarot imagery, imagined worlds, and pieces inspired by nature all provide room to explore ideas that can be serious, playful, beautiful, unsettling, or simply fun.

Fantasy gives us the freedom to experiment without requiring every piece to belong to the same world or tell the same kind of story.

And sometimes that experimentation wanders well outside painting entirely.

More Than a Portfolio

Submerged Studio is a working studio rather than a static portfolio.

New work is constantly being developed, older work occasionally resurfaces from the archives, and long-term projects grow alongside individual paintings and illustrations.

The shop reflects that range. Visitors may find original artwork, limited and open edition prints, licensed work, tarot pieces, mixed-media experiments, and other projects as they become available.

You never quite know what will pop up.

Why “Submerged”?

The name Submerged Studio comes from the idea that what is visible is only a small portion of what exists beneath the surface, not only in art, but in humanity as well.

A finished piece may be what eventually appears in a gallery or shop, but underneath it are decades of practice, failed experiments, sketches, research, strange ideas, new techniques, and the constant process of figuring out what to make next.

People can be much the same. What you see at first glance is only a fraction of who someone is. Underneath are thousands of layers, experiences, ideas, and possibilities for who they can become.

What You’ll Find Here

This blog is where we will share some of that larger world: new work, materials and process, studio updates, older pieces worth revisiting, projects developing behind the scenes, random thoughts, and occasionally some silly moments.

Welcome to Submerged Studio.