Dennis Balogh & John Olesky at Hudson's Art on the Green

 

Balogh heading to Brooklyn for a wedding

Retired BJ chief artist Dennis Balogh will be heading to Brooklyn in September for his daughter’s wedding. She lives there.

Dennis and wife Patty’s daughter Lori is in New York City as a designer for a graphic design firm. Dennis and Patty also have two sons.

But Saturday Dennis was ensconced in his usual August hangout, Hudson’s 35^th annual Art on the Green where Darrow Road (Ohio 91) and Ohio 303 meet.

Balogh has been a regular at Art on the Green, missing a year here and there.

In other years, it was retired BJ photographer Denny Gordon’s wife, Bonnie, and her sculptures, former BJ chief artist Art Krummel with his paintings and former Features Department editor and columnist Connie Bloom with her fabric art (formerly know as quilt art) as Ohio’s fabric art guru. 

Dennis’ art pedigree is impeccable.

Balogh’s illustrations have graced such magazines as the Saturday Evening Post (the cover), Kiplinger Financial, New York Stock Exchange, St. Louis Magazine, Success Magazine and  Harvard's HBS Magazine.

The National Association of Black Journalists, National Headliner Awards and Creativity Annual are among his awards. He did portaits of the past presidents of Samford University in Alabama that hang on the campus walls. He has illustrated the top CEO's of the year for New York Stock Exchange Magazine.
 

He got his training wheels by doing Channels magazine cover illustrations for me during my days as television editor at Ol’ Blue Walls.

I was the midwife at Channels’ birth in 1980 and left by baby in others’ hands when I retired in 1996. Today there is no Channels, obliterated by the plethora of cable channels and on-screen TV guides that can be changed by the hour.

Balogh went from Cooper School of Arts in Cleveland to the Cleveland Press to the Columbus Dispatch to the BJ. Today, he and his wife live in Broadview Heights.

After 21 years at the BJ, starting in 1985, Balogh was part of a major exodus in 2006 when 335 years of experience walked out the door. 

In 2000 the Beacon art staff included Terence Oliver, John “Derf” Backderf, Art Krummel, Rick Steinhauser, Phil White, Dennis Earlenbaugh and Balogh. It used to be if you said, “Come here, Dennis,” when Dennis Haas also was there, a crowd would show up.

Fifteen years later, they’re no longer at Ol’ Blue Walls.

Terence Oliver added this note after reading this original article:

“Hey John,

“I just saw your nice story on Balogh. Good job! Just wanted to let you know a few other awesome folks were in the Art Dept. in 2000, too. Kathy, Deb and Jemal were there, too. We also had Brian Shelito  before he was transferred to sports to avoid being part of a layoff. And I think technically, Art had moved up as a Technology manager. 

“Best,

“Terence”

The BJ did, indeed, have an awesome art department. Including the late Clyde “Bud” Morris, Joe Grace and Walt Neal before the 2000 crowd took over.