Advances in free electron lasers (FELs) which generate high energy photons are expected to open novel nonlinear optics in the x-ray and vacuum ultraviolet (VUV) regions. In this paper, we report a new method for performing VUV-FEL focusing experiments. A VUV-FEL was focused with Kirkpatrick-Baez optics on a multilayer target, which contains fused silica as a fluorescent material. By measuring the fluorescence, a 5.6x4.9 microm(2) focal spot was observed in situ. Fluorescence was used to measure the saturable absorption of VUV pulses in the tin layer. The transmission increases nonlinearly higher with increasing laser intensity.