Amy Johnson

Artist Statement

I am an enamel artist from Rochester, Minnesota. I blend together metal, fire and glass to give life and color to my jewelry. I also meld different metals to fashion beautiful sterling silver spinner rings, copper bracelets, necklaces, and earrings; each piece has a personality of its own. Some of my work is elegant and graceful, while other pieces resemble a whirlwind of color and light.

Artist Bio

My journey with enamel started when I took a class in Bloomington, MN back in 2016. At that point, I was making jewelry with a variety of different metals and wanted to explore more techniques to breathe some life in to my jewelry.  At the time, I didn’t know anything about enamel. I didn’t even know that I would be working with glass.   It took one class in enameling and I was hooked immediately.  The vibrant color palette was beautiful!  The process of taking powdered glass in an array of colors, heating it with a torch or kiln to make a jewel-like surface, was magical!  This class was like heaven on earth!  The instructor was Jean Vanbrederode of Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania, a well-known master enamel artist.  Jean, a former English teacher, taught this class with amazing clarity.   She would first explain the steps we would be doing through a PowerPoint.  Then we would immediately start working on the process with her by our side.  My project I was working on was an enameled book pendant.  I learned how to bind pages for the book pendant, cut copper shapes with a jewelers saw, apply enamel and torch fire to a glassy surface, and then assemble the different pieces.   That was my first of many more projects.