Dennis G. Bayuzick, age 76, loving partner and father; renowned printer, artist, and professor of art, passed away on December 8, 2022.

Dennis was born in Homestead, PA on September 16, 1946, a son of the late Stephen and Elizabeth (nee: Bayuzik) Bayuzick.

He completed his liberal arts studies at Franklin and Marshall College, Lancaster, PA; his B.S. Art and his M.Ed. in Art Education from Edinboro State College, Edinboro, PA; his M.F.A. Painting from Ohio School of Art, Athens, OH; finally, his Comparative Art Studies in the Doctoral Program at Ohio University.

His professional career included working as an Art Instructor at Slippery Rock H.S., in Slippery Rock, PA, and as a Teaching Associate in Painting/Studio Foundations and a full-time visiting instructor in Painting and Drawing with the Ohio School of Art.  For over 35 years Dennis taught a variety of studio art courses in painting, 2-D design, and drawing at UW Parkside, mentoring many aspiring art students to more personal and disciplined creativity.  He was very proud of his equally long tenure as coordinator of Art Education at UW Parkside.  During this time, he supervised many student teachers in local public schools, helping guide over 70 students to K-12 certification in Art, many of whom are now successful full-time art students.

He taught art teachers how to be teachers, placing them in community schools throughout the county, and supervised their progress.  Dennis helped establish a generation of highly qualified educators that have held positions throughout the United States.

Since 1977, Dennis organized and hosted over 30 years of biennial high school art invitational shows as well as local art teacher exhibits for the UW Parkside galleries, fostering good community-university relations while developing recruitment potential by bringing many high school art students to campus to see their art on display.

In his own art, Dennis emphasized the symbolic potential of seemingly common still life arrangements, usually including a self- portrait strategically positioned somewhere in the composition, and generally favored the purple side of the color spectrum.  Dennis encouraged his painting students by offering extra credit for attempting a challenging self- portrait in their own compositions.  His still life paintings were developed as he completed the tasks he set out for his students.

Over the years, Dennis had been included in countless local, regional, and national juried invitational art exhibitions winning numerous awards.  His airbrush paintings were published nationally in Airbrush Action magazine, and he also developed a full-fledged airbrush painting curriculum at Parkside, one of very few such programs in Wisconsin.  He showed his artwork at the Joy Horwitz Gallery in Chicago as a surrealist, displaying his airbrush paintings.

In 1985, Dennis received a Fellowship Award mention from the Wisconsin Arts Board for outstanding achievement.

Survivors include his life partner Gabriela Pettit; his children, Alexander Z. (McKenzie) Pettit and Tetyana K. Pettit; his granddaughter, Anastasia Pettit-Delabio, and his siblings, Ronald (Dorothy) Bayuzick, Andrea "Cookie" (Dan) Sheldon, and Nancy (R L) Evans.

Service Details

Funeral services will be held on Saturday, December 17, 2022 at 6:00 p.m. in the Draeger Langendorf Funeral Home.  A visitation will take place on Saturday from 4:00 p.m. until 6:00 p.m. at the funeral home.  The family requests that those attending wear something purple, Dennis's favorite color. Private interment will take place in Oakwood Cemetery, Somers.

Memorial Suggestions

The Bayuzick family has suggested memorials in Dennis's name to the UW Parkside Library. Checks can be made payable to: UW Parkside Foundation, 900 Wood Road, Kenosha, Wisconsin 53144, or use the following link to donate:

https://www.uwp.edu/giving/donate.cfm