At 28 years old, Manhattan-grown, New York-based Filipina artist Jana Benitez had already held 17 exhibits, 11 of which are solo, and had already explored much of the world and her spirituality. She has been apprenticing for various international artists, been exploring parts of Asia, been living in artistic communities in the US and in the Philippines, and has been called brave by modernist painter Anita Magsaysay-Ho. The daughter of former Philippine Women's University Jose Conrado Benitez and New York investment banker Joanne de Asis, Jana Benitez, with the 28 years of artistic adventures she has been in, continues to pursue her interesting journeys in art and in life, adding to her wisdom that not every one of her age has.
"As far back as I can remember, I was always painting and drawing. It is my mother tongue. It has always been my passion, my refuge, my playground, my teacher, and my compass," says Jana when asked about realizing the artist in her at a young age. Jana Benitez had her first exhibition of pastel drawings of faces at Ayala Museum, the same place where her current exhibit is displayed, in 1998 when she was only 12 years old. Art making was not really what she focused on at that time but more on doing what she was enjoying and was passionate about. For her, painting came naturally and was not something she thought of as a career.
She pursued the arts upon growing up, attending several universities to take formal education on this. In fact, she became the magna cum laude when she took up Bachelor of Arts in Visual Communication in Brown University. In the process of finishing her studies, she had already held a number of exhibits and had also apprenticed with different artists all over the world. read more