Artist creates largest water mosaic in the world using 66,000 coffee cups - video

An artist spent hours painstakingly arranging 66,000 coffee cups filled with coloured rainwater to form a monumental mosaic.

With the help of 100 volunteers, Canadian artist Belo built a stunning image entirely out of the content inside the cups to raise awareness about the importance of universal access to drinkable water.

In the video the artist - whose full name is Serge Belo - meticulously drops varying degrees of vegetable dye into biodegradable cups filled with rainwater to achieve the colour varieties.

Using a spectrum of reds, oranges and browns, the artist and his volunteers carefully line up the cups, kneeling on skateboards to manoeuvre around the work. They are careful to put the cups in the right order - as a few wrongly placed cups could destroy the spectacular mosaic.

Belo used 15,000 litres of rainwater and 1kg of vegetable dye to mix his colours. In total it took him 62 hours to create the unusual piece of art.

The ambitious project required so many cups that if placed end to end it they would be 5.2km long. At 3,600sq feet, Belo claims the artwork is the largest water mosaic in the world.

The mosaic was commissioned by charity One Drop, which works to raise awareness of the importance of clean, sanitary water. The image, which is unveiled at the end, serves to emphasise how vital clean and drinkable water is for life.