Jana Roberts Benzon has a diverse artistic background in various mediums, but polymer has captured her creative spirit like nothing else….its ability to become just about anything is the height of creative freedom.  Jana has focused on creating her brand of intricate “millefiori” canework and in perfecting her innovative techniques for building and reducing canes.  From those canes, Jana loves creating interesting, dimensional jewelry pieces often evocative of Arabic or old world designs.  While she’ll never leave the geometric symmetry of caning, these days she’s having a great time exploring the world of organic forms and “cutwork”.
Jana has always loved being a teacher  and enjoys teaching polymer clay workshops internationally.
She loves living in the Intermountain West where she can indulge in her favorite outdoor pastimes of hiking, snowshoeing and exploring.

Jana’s art is dedicated to her mother..

I use a low-fire polymer clay-like product to create my pieces. It is available in many colors, but I prefer using more basic, primary colors, then blending and mixing to achieve the desired shades. The clay hardens in an oven.
Some of my work is created from the “millefiori canes” I create with polymer clay. Many of these canes are referred to as ‘arabesque’, as they visually fit that description. Others are patterned after beautiful, old tiles or have an Art Nouveau flavor, or were even inspired by a fabric swatch.

Millefiori means “thousand flowers” in Italian. It originated as the use of “canes” (in the shape of a drinking straw) of different colors of glass arranged in a bundle. When the bundle of glass is viewed from each end, the pattern of a flower or other decorative image is seen. After the glass is fused, slices are taken off of the cane and used as decoration. Millefiori has decorated objects from the time of ancient Mesopotamia to the present day. In the 1970’s, the technique of Millefiori caning was adapted to polymer clay by ingenious artists.
With polymer, different colors of the clay are blended and then manipulated into shapes which are combined with other shapes, to create a long loaf which is called a “cane” (like the bundles of glass described above, the components in this long cane remain straight and true through the length of the cane. I like to use sushi as an example — the components inside sushi are lined up ‘straight and true’, as seen when it’s sliced all along the length of the sushi “cane” to create identical pieces). A cane can be created in any size, but typically mine are 4″ in diameter by around 5″ long.
After this long cane is completed, it is manipulated by hand to warm it up, and then it’s lengthened and pulled, almost like a taffy pull, shrinking down the outer measurement of the cane, while also making the cane much longer. We call this “reduction”….in reducing a cane, the designs become fine and more intricate, as evidenced in the images of some of my canes pictured below. The 4×5″ cane mentioned above would likely measure 5′ long with a 1” diameter after reduction. I then take slices off of these canes to create some of my jewelry pieces.

Laser Cut
The items on this page are created using my “Laser Cut” technique – a lofty sounding name for a technique that does not employ an actual laser beam 🙂  I gave the technique that title for the laser-like, precise cuts involved.   The colors in the designs are achieved through the use of different colors of clay.  Occasionally, alcohol inks are used to enhance color.

Cutwork
The work shown in this gallery is generally termed ‘cutwork’, but more specific styles, I’ve labelled as “new age bargello”, “encrusted” and “taking flight”, among others.These pieces  are created with different colors of clay and occasionally enhanced with the use of alcohol inks.

Caned: dimensional
The designs pictured in this gallery were created using my millefiori canework.  I have labelled many of these pieces as ‘dimensional’ work, for the dimension produced when many slices from the millefiori canes are layered upon each other in creating the piece. The colors in the designs are achieved through the use of different colors of clay…no paints or pigments are used.

Οrganics
This work is not created using my millefiori canework, but as with caning, the different colors in each piece are achieved through the use of different colors of clay.

Still life
These latest pieces are ones I’ve labeled ‘still life’ and have been extraordinarily rewarding to create!  They are brooch pins, and measure from 2.5″ to about 3″.  All are composed primarily with different colors of polymer, and with very minimal additions (such as embossing powders or inks).