New York artist Kim Keever has taken the art of the aquascape to its very boundaries, creating scenery and effects that could make the most committed 'scaper look amateur by comparison.
Using a 750 l/200 gal aquarium as his centerpiece, he creates exquisite dioramas of stunning environments, fictitious but dappled with nostalgic senses of realism, and then submerges the lot. Into this aquatic layout he introduces doses of paint, and records the effects of these underwater 'cloudscapes' on his designs. The results, quite simply, are breathtaking (scroll down for videos to see these effects).
All imagery is taken using a large format camera, and with meticulously positioned lights, further background designs that sit behind the aquarium in the dry area, and canvas skylines and cloud effects, he records his images as the liquid cloud formations form the visual aesthetics he desires.
His work encapsulates scratch-built objects, salvaged decoration and endless ingenuity to create the images we see here.
Obviously, no such aquarium could ever be the domain of a fish or even the hardiest, most paint tolerant of invertebrates, but as an example of how an aquarium can become the artist’s tool, we need look no further than Kim Keever’s fascinating, haunting and melancholic worlds.
Check out the videos below to get a flavour of his style: