Lily Pond (Premier version)

When she was six, Shelley Daniels Lekven, along with her sister, brother and best friend, started building a clay town on the dining room table with some old balls of modeling clay. Her parents, remarkably, let it stay. "Claytown" thrived and grew to become the centerpiece of their childhoods.

Shortly before graduating from college, Lekven wrote a poem she called "Lily Pond." The story follows the vivid imagination of a little frog as she daydreams about her future, with all its possibilities and promise of adventure. Lily considers travels to distant lands, saving lives, fame, acclaim and possible careers all from the safety of her cozy bed. Lekven decided the poem would be fun to illustrate in clay for a children's book, so she set her diploma aside and honed her sculpting skills. Her career as a freelance 3D artist in San Diego, New York and Los Angeles led to her work as a character sculptor on THE NIGHTMARE BEFORE CHRISTMAS and TOY STORY, and as the sculpting supervisor on JAMES & THE GIANT PEACH.

Through the years, Lekven continued working on the illustrations for LILY POND as time allowed. They were sculpted from soft colored modeling clay and professionally photographed. Skies were added later in Photoshop. From start to finish (with a lot of living in between), LILY POND took thirty-eight years to complete.

Lekven lives in San Diego with her husband and three children, all of whom would rather draw than sculpt.