Wacky artist creates amazing pre-historic landscapes in 6ft FISHTANKS… but sadly there’s no room for the fish

By Helen Collis

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Artist Kim Keever creates unbelievable vistas by painstakingly building scale models by hand of natural scenes.

The New Yorker places the landscapes in front of or behind a six foot-long, 200 gallon glass tank filled with water.

He then adds climate atmosphere by injecting paint into the water to form dramatic clouds.

Sunset: This dramatic picture looks lie a Hellish scene of perhaps a raging distant fire in prehistoric times

Sunset: This dramatic picture looks lie a Hellish scene of perhaps a raging distant fire in prehistoric times

Unusual: 'What makes these dioramas unusual is that they are created in a 200 gallon tank filled with water,' says artist Kim Keever, who uses paint to create incredible atmospheres

Unusual: 'What makes these dioramas unusual is that they are created in a 200 gallon tank filled with water,' says artist Kim Keever, who uses paint to create incredible atmospheres

New Yorker Mr Keever painstakingly creates model scene

New Yorker Mr Keever painstakingly creates model scenes, in this case two birds flapping their wings, before beginning the careful process of forming an atmosphere using drops of ink in his fish tank

The magnificent result is a somewhat eerie, misty, underwater representation of our planet, minus the human beings

The magnificent result is a somewhat eerie, misty, underwater representation of our planet, minus the human beings

The reality

The reality: 'Though I sometimes build a scene in front of and behind the tank, most of the "action" takes place in the tank with paint injected into the water for cloud formations,' Mr Keever said

The results seem to be a glimpse of a pre-historic world before man or even alien landscapes.

Kim said: 'What makes these dioramas unusual is that they are created in a 200 gallon tank filled with water.

'Though I sometimes build a scene in front of and behind the tank, most of the "action" takes place in the tank with paint injected into the water for cloud formations.

Bleak: While Mr Keever uses some animals in his scenes, his work has been said to mirror life on Earth in pre-historic times due to the absence of people

Bleak: While Mr Keever uses some animals in his scenes, his work has been said to mirror life on Earth in pre-historic times due to the absence of people

'It is my intention to present the landscape as beauty itself, without reference to man and industry,' artist Mr Keever said

'It is my intention to present the landscape as beauty itself, without reference to man and industry,' artist Mr Keever said

'I use whatever materials I can find on the street, in stores and on the internet that might add to a perception of reality that is not quite what it seems.

'It is my intention to present the landscape as beauty itself, without reference to man and industry.

'The adjective "catastrophic" is sometimes connected to my work because the question is asked, "what happened to the people?" 'Though any work I've made could be a place here on earth, I think of these panoramas as existing millions of years ago, today, or millions of years in the future. It has been suggested that the landscapes could be from another planet.'

The result of Mt Keever's unusual style of art and photography often resembles an scary and uninhabited world, like something from a J.R.R. Tolkien fantasy
Artist Kim Keever

The result of Mr Keever's unusual style of art and photography often resembles a scary and uninhabited world, like something from a J.R.R. Tolkien fantasy

All is revealed: Behind the glass tank, Mr Keever reveals how he build up a scene with hand-made trees, cotton wool for clouds and clever, dramatic lighting

All is revealed: Behind the glass tank, Mr Keever reveals how he build up a scene with hand-made trees, cotton wool for clouds and clever, dramatic lighting

Aerial view: This incredible picture looks as though it is taken from a bird's eye view sweeping high above a rugged and desolate landscape

Aerial view: This incredible picture looks as though it is taken from a bird's eye view sweeping high above a rugged and desolate landscape

With warm light filtering in from the left, dark cloud in the distance and bare branches in the foreground, this could be a winter morning on pre-historic Earth

With warm light filtering in from the left, dark cloud in the distance and bare branches in the foreground, this could be a winter morning on pre-historic Earth

Lush: This more lush scene conjures up ideas of a world inhabited by the like of Avatar characters

Lush: This more lush scene conjures up ideas of a world inhabited by the like of Avatar characters

Ominous: Fortunately this scene is only a tiny model, as few would want to wonder through this setting

Ominous: Fortunately this scene is only a tiny model, as few would want to wonder through this setting


 

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