Kim Keever

Kim Keever studied thermal engineering and spent a summer conducting research at NASA before he became an artist. He creates these large-scale photographs by constructing miniature topographies inside a 100-gallon aquarium. First, Keever fills the tank with water and adds pigments, next he lights the tank with colored gels, and then he uses a large-format camera to capture the ephemeral atmospheres on film. The result is a strange and beautiful image, one that initially seems to be a document of a real environment, but in the end is merely an artistic illusion. His works reference the history of landscape painting, the sublime, and dialogues on the relationship between art and nature. “Beauty is often considered a dirty word in the art world,” the artist observes. “But some people get away with it, and hopefully I’m one of them.”