Fourth Place Winner, Paulo Pacheco, Brazil | Image: IAPLC
During the 1990s, a new discipline was born: aquascaping. The activity, made popular by Japanese wildlife photographer Takashi Amano, has become an artform. These aquarium designs are far from your average neon colored rocks, plastic sunken ship and the odd aquatic fern.
An official competition has grown up around the hobby, namely the International Aquatic Plants Layout Contest (IAPLC). Years of work go into the placement and development of these all-natural aquascapes, and the results are beautiful.
The 2015 IAPLC contest winners were announced in September. Winners were selected from a pool of 2,545 entries from 69 countries. The art has yet to catch on in the United States; only 13 entries were from Americans, with Japan, China, Brazil and France being the countries most represented.
Some photos of the finalist tanks are shown above and below. See more photographs and read more about the art and competition at Vice. Via Colossal.
Grand Prize Winner Takayuki Fukada, Japan | Image: IAPLC
Eighth Runner Up, タナカカツキ, Japan | Image: IAPLC