Painting in Water by Kim Keever
The colorful and velveteen clouds surrounded by mysterious auras are the creations of a former NASA engineer turned artist, Kim Keever. These are the spectacular images of colorful pigments moving inside a 200-gallon aquarium tank. When the pigments meet the water, they form stunning cloud-like shapes and patterns. Kim then takes time-lapsed shots as they change.
The ambience of the water scenes designed by Kim speaks volumes, particularly when various colors intersect, creating astonishing multi-dimensional depth effects. Layer after layer of colors are both dazzling and eye-catching, allowing people to witness gorgeous performances one after another. Behind the scenes, Kim executes very precise procedures involving the quantity and timing of the release of those pigments into the tank in order to create the effects he desires. Kim has been working with water for more than two decades and has won international acclaim. His images are one of a kind and understandably sought after among art admirers.
We are happy to have been able to speak with Kim and learn about his unique artwork. We hope you enjoy our conversation, below:
Q: Your art is absolutely beautiful. Please tell us about the path that led you to produce such vibrant prints.
A: Thank you. I love beauty and I am always in search of beauty while trying to avoid the sentimental.
I continued my engineering studies after getting a bachelor’s degree. My original plan was to become successful as an engineer, retire and make art. Once I realized life was not as long as I had envisioned, I dropped everything and became a full-time artist. I am glad I made that decision and I feel lucky to live the dream and make the art I enjoy making.
Q: Please share with us the techniques and equipment you use to create these amazing photographic images.
A: I am constantly changing my techniques to direct the paint into the water and guide it in certain directions. That said, once it leaves my squeezable paint bottles it makes its own way. At the moment, I am placing sheer fabric in the tank and to my surprise, it flows in interesting ways. I can design the whole process to a certain extent but after a few seconds random patterns and colors take over. When I place the paint into the water I get interesting patterns in front of and behind the fabric. This is all done in a 200-gallon aquarium.
Q: What is your philosophy regarding colors and how do you utilize color in your creations?
A: I keep a large selection of colors ready to go in bottles. I don’t generally think about any particular color pattern I’m looking for until the last minute. Sometimes I use more color but the more color I use the less I can predict the outcome. The colors also move around randomly and ultimately I have a lot of images to choose from. I take anywhere from 30 to 60 photographs with each pour. I’m up to almost 58,000 shots at the moment. As you can imagine, this is a lot to go through.
Q: When you create your pieces, what are you looking for: the atmosphere, esthetics, or visual expression of emotion, something else?
A: Most of the time I can’t say I’m really looking for anything specific. I start the process and just let everything go the way it will. The paint flows at a certain pace so I really don’t have enough time to take a specific photograph. There are periods where I can tell something interesting is happening so I take more shots.
It’s only after a shoot as I go through the images I start looking for atmosphere, esthetics, and so on. Each image suggests it has certain qualities and that’s what I look for.
Q: Besides abstracts, you have also created landscapes and solid objects. Please tell us more about these projects and how they are different from your abstract pieces.
A: I made the landscape pieces in the tank for many years. These were more in the nature of planned projects. I would make drawings of a landscape scenario and loosely reproduce it in the tank. Then I would work on that particular landscape making various changes along the way for months, sometimes up to 5 or 6 months. This was a very different way of working and obviously much more specific in nature. The water in the tank gave me a certain atmosphere and placing paint in the water was a good representation for clouds. It was the dropping of the paint into the water that brought me to the idea of making that the main direction of the work.
Q: Based on your years of experience experimenting with ink in water, what is observed in these colored pigments in terms of the way they swirl and move?
A: I’ve actually experimented with almost anything that dissolves in water. Oil would not mix and would be an extraordinary amount of cleanup. Along with ink I mainly use colored paint pigments. The inks tend to lend a beautiful transparency while the other colors contrast with solid forms. The solid forms tend to be very volumetric and I am always looking for interesting shapes I haven’t seen before. It’s similar to looking at clouds. Most clouds have a very typical look but occasionally you look up and see incredible abstract or familiar forms. Speaking of familiar forms, I see many figures in my own work and my friends are always pointing them out to me.
Q: Does any artist or literature inspire your work?
A: I’ve always been inspired by Cindy Sherman’s work. She has explored and continues to explore unusual variations of portraiture. My other inspiration would be Picasso. He did so much work with so many different materials. I thought I could catch up to him… Maybe that seems like too lofty a goal but I was very taken with a quote from Michelangelo: “it’s not that you set your goals too high, it’s that you set your goals too low and achieve them.” In other words, most people quit trying once they’ve reached a certain point.
Q: What projects are you currently working on and where can people view them?
A: I try to keep up with Instagram. It’s a good venue for artists and I always recommend it to new artists I meet. As is obvious with so many things, the Internet is an amazing gift for artists. At one point you had to invite people to your studio, later in time you could show them slides, and now anyone around the world can see your work on the Internet. That’s an amazing transition and I am very grateful. I work with various galleries and I recently moved to Miami from Manhattan. Though I miss certain things about Manhattan, I am able to maintain ties with my galleries and friends.
We hope you found our interview with Kim enlightening. We thank Kim for spending time with us and look forward to more amazing images from him.
Kim’s Instagram