Fimo Wolf                      Fimo Lizard

These exquisite illustrated creatures, each one individual in design and personality, are the handmade work of Jon Stuart Anderson; the foremost polymer clay sculptor in the world today. The images on these animals are created with Jon’s amazing "Fiore" technique, based on the ancient glass art of millifiore. This artistic technique has been honed by over a decade of hard work, creative vision, and dedication to the art of polymer clay. 'FIMO' is the trademarked brand name of polymer clay Jon uses to create his sculptures. These clays are available in a variety of stock colors, but Jon is constantly blending and mixing them to create his own pallet. The clays evolve into the hues and fades that are the basis for the “Fiore” images themselves.

The images and patterns are all created by Jon’s hand. He begins by laying long canes or blocks of different colors of clay next to each other, starting from the center of the design and working outward, creating a number of visual borders around the original image. When first constructed, each of these illustrations in clay is the cross section of a block of clay the size of a large loaf of bread. The loaf is stretched to double its length and then cut in half. This process is repeated over and over, reducing the actual size of the previous image by half each time, until the final cross section is about the size of a small coin. The size of the image shrinks down and down, but amazingly, no detail is lost. The small, illustrated canes are then thinly sliced into intricate tiles using a surgical scalpel. 

This build up and shrink down process of the “Fiore” technique is the same for each unique tile design, and each animal is laboriously made up of many multitudes of different hand applied tiles. The final Fimo Creation is incredibly detailed with superb shadings only attainable by the lengthy cane making process. What you see on the finished clay sculpture as a small quarter inch tile of a ladybug may have started out as a design over 6 inches across.

The actual forms or Armatures of the animals are created either from left over clay carefully hand molded, or hand carved wood. Once the tiles have been pressed onto the armature, the piece is cured and then fired for a period of hours, further reducing the images and tightening the spaces between the individual tiles. This process may create crazing or tiny fissures in the clay, which adds to the uniqueness of each piece. Finally the eyeballs are carefully selected and applied to give each creature its own special personality.

One of the more enjoyable parts of our dealing with Jon’s work is that it is constantly changing. When Jon makes a particular cane and cuts it into the small tiles his studio will use to make the Fimo sculptures, this unique design exists only in a limited number of pieces defined by the size of the cane. It will be used along with many other tiles to make any given Fimo animal and when it is finally used up and gone forever no more creatures can be made with these same images. Because all sculptures and tiles are completely handmade, no two are ever exactly alike, rendering each piece unique and collectible. Each year new tiles and new creatures appear.

An accomplished painter, sculptor and jewelry designer, Jon has lived among incredibly diverse cross-sections of the world's people from Central America to the Far East. His designs show the influences of classical Moorish motifs, Native American spirits, ancient petroglyphs, Celtic themes and more. Born the thirteenth son of an immigrant lettuce rancher in Kingman, Arizona. His formal art education includes studies at the Universidad de Las Americas under Sr. Julio Chavez, portrait artist to the Spanish Court, a position formerly held by such world-renowned artists as Francisco Goya. Jon also holds a Masters degree from Texas A&M. Currently living and creating in Bali, Indonesia, Jon's fascination with color, balance, design and form has led him to the absolute pinnacle of his chosen medium.