A world full of color and imagination - that’s how Anita Varga’s creations can be described in simple words. The artist is a lover of fantasy stories where magic can be a weapon, adventure is everywhere, love is a mystery and dragons are real.
Recalling the beginning of her clay adventure Anita says that she’s always loved arts, but the fact that she tried working with polymer clay was one of the best decisions of her life. This makes us smile because we can definitely relate to her story. Many of us remember that moment when a lump of clay became the center of our creative world.
“My artworks are mostly fantasy related because I love all magic creatures such as fairies, dragons and even monsters,” says Anita. “They are all beautiful to me and another reason why I love them is because I can create my characters according to my imagination and I can also paint them with any color I wish.”
When you are not afraid to dream and when you create your own fairy tale creatures, you create your own magic. Creative people don’t always see the world as it is. Sometimes it is sprinkled with stardust.
Anita believes that working with polymer clay is a neverending beautiful and exciting journey which is limited only by our imagination. “There is always something to learn and I love challenging myself,” she discloses. As a self-taught artist the beginning was not easy but she didn't give up and strived every day to improve her skills.
We asked Anita what are the sources of her inspiration. “Anything I can see inspires me day by day: a picture, a movie, other artist's artworks, so my mind is always full with new ideas and every day I am ready to create something new to make everyone smile.”
Anita’s sculpting journey started with a video she saw about two years ago. It was about a fairy jar that she fell in love with, so the young artist decided to give it a try and create something similar, something out of a fairy land. Why fairy tales and fantasy creatures? Anita believes she fell in love with magical creatures in her childhood. “When I was a child, I used to play fantasy video games and read lots of fairy tale books. I admired these creatures because they were born in our imagination, their appearances can be endless, they can be empowered with supernatural skills and have unique colors,” the artist mentions.
At the beginning Anita tried to make characters as easy as possible, just to get some experience, but at the same time she aimed to learn how to create something more complex and also how to build the armature for more intricate figurines. “I use aluminum wire, aluminum foil, masking tape and sometimes even hot glue to build my armatures. When the armature is ready I start putting the first layer of polymer clay. At this point I start adding details, which is one of my favorite parts of sculpting!”
Since she started this kind of art, Anita’s studio started to fill with plenty of different tools which she uses during the detailing process, such as rubber shapers, carving and ball stylus tools, explorer tools and literally anything that can be found in the house, even a toothbrush. “Usually when I sculpt my own design I just sculpt as I go without any sketch, but when I create something that already exists - for example a cartoon character - I make proper measurements and I draw sketches to ensure my sculpture will look as close as possible as the original one.”
The final step of the creation is painting, which is another part of the process Anita adores. Just as detailing, painting can be a very long process as she strives to mix the colors to get different shades and coordinating colors, making sure everything fits together.
“Sculpting is not the easiest art I have ever tried but I have to say it is the most exciting one,” Anita mentions. “It takes a huge amount of time and patience. Sometimes it can be frustrating but when I finally see my finished sculpture, I always realize it’s worth every moment and it doesn’t matter if my creation is perfect or not, I love it the way it is as I created it with all of my heart!”
