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Balamuth Finds Art and Direction at Keene State

Jean Balamuth
Jean Balamuth

Jean Balamuth has worn many hats in her 55 years. A wife and mother of three, the northern New Jersey native has not only had a culinary career that included stints as a cook, salad preparer, and cake decorator, but has also held jobs in human services and education, as a substitute teacher and bus driver, as well as a caretaker position on a large country estate in nearby Alstead, NH.

Come May, Balamuth plans to add a notable accomplishment to her eclectic and varied list of vocations when she graduates with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from Keene State College. “I’m enjoying the journey. I will always enjoy the journey,” said Balamuth, who tends to look ahead instead of dwelling on the past. But she also knows that she couldn’t have completed that journey without the support of caring neighbors (KSC benefactors Gordon and Helene R. Moodie) who guided her to the College, an astute and accessible faculty and staff that allowed her artistic imagination to flourish, and a kindhearted husband who, while not a working artist himself, supports her artwork.

Jean Balamuth exemplifies what it takes to be a nontraditional student with a nontraditional background, someone who used her love and passion for art to finally attain a long and elusive degree. “Looking back, I guess you can call it a great story,” she said. The next to youngest of eight children who were born in two distinct waves over 17 years, Balamuth displayed a penchant for art at an early age. “Art was always a part of my life because I had lots more time than money,” she said with a grin.

Moving to Springfield, MA, Balamuth attended Technical High School, but quit at the age of 16 when she became pregnant. A year later, in 1976, she earned a GED and enrolled at Springfield Technical Community College, where she took business courses in hopes of pursuing a career in restaurant management.

Those plans were put on hold when her then-husband was offered a job in southern New Hampshire. A hesitant city girl at first, she quickly adapted and became enamored with the rural setting. “It was like a breath of fresh air,” said Balamuth, who with her husband and young daughter took up residence and became caretakers of an estate in Alstead. “Life was good. We thought we’d found paradise.” The Little House on the Prairie existence suited Balamuth well. The stay-at-home mom had 4-H in her life, not to mention two more children and an assortment of animals, including a thoroughbred horse named “Sail Away” who qualified for the 1980 Olympics.

In her late 20s, Balamuth was faced with a decision. She could either stay with her husband, who’d been offered a lucrative job, or remain on the estate. In the end, she chose happiness over wealth and uncertainty. “I looked at these happy kids and I wasn’t willing to give that up,” she said.

Balamuth and her kids eventually did move, along with her current husband, Michael – down the road to a farm where they hoped to raise organic crops. Needless to say, there was a lot to learn. “We thought we could throw some seeds in the ground and have our way with the farm,” she said. “It’s very labor intensive. Now I know why farmers had 10 kids – you need to grow your own work force.”

Farming wasn’t the only thing on Balamuth’s mind. She still had the desire to return to school. Balamuth considered Keene State when she first moved to New Hampshire, but the timing wasn’t right. Now the timing was right. A job at Kurn Hattin Homes (a residential school in Westminster, VT) offered a use-it-or-lose-it education allowance that Balamuth wasn’t about to leave unutilized.

An optimistic Balamuth enrolled at Keene State as a continuing education student in 1998. One of her first classes was a course in two-dimensional design taught by former KSC professor Tara Sullivan. Why art? “I was working and juggling things and standing on my head, and I think I needed something for me, so I took it as a fun thing,” she said. “It fulfilled a college requirement and I had the time of my life.”

Despite her fascination with art, Balamuth thought a degree in management made more practical sense. However, a class in quantitative decision-making caused a change of plans and some serious soul searching. “I got through that class with a C and it almost killed me. I was in over my head and in tears,” she said.

A trip to the academic advising office and a meeting with counselor Gloria Lodge helped Balamuth find a renewed passion for art. “She told me I wasn’t in the right program and recommended that I try another art class,” Balamuth said.

Artistic creativity eventually won out over management accountability. In 2005, Balamuth submitted her portfolio and was accepted to the BFA program at Keene State. “That’s the real me. I’m artsy and creative and I’m not an academic,” she said. “I loved my career at Keene State and now I’m going to finish it with a degree.”

Being an adult learner isn’t easy. Balamuth sometimes finds herself in unusual situations – like the start of the semester when students mistake her for a professor and start shoving add/drop slips under her nose. “You should see the look on the kids’ faces when they find out I’m not the teacher,” she said. “It’s priceless.”

Many times Balamuth’s experience and know-how have come in handy. When one of the assignments in Professor Walter Nicolai’s class in 3D design called for sewing, Balamuth jumped right in, teaching her younger classmates how to maneuver a needle and thread.

Earning a BFA degree isn’t easy. Students must demonstrate skills in five disciplines, including drawing, sculpture, ceramics, painting (figure and abstract), and her favorite, printmaking. “The beauty of printmaking is, whatever you’re feeling, it comes right back to you,” Balamuth said. “It’s so unique. When you print it you never know what you’re going to get. When you do a series of prints your ink and design work come together, and you get a print. You just fall in love with it.”

Balamuth’s work was far from conventional. Who else would come up with a fat ceramic owl named “Tootsie” or a nine-by-15 foot sculpture made of 100 baguettes, 46 loaves of bread, three dozen bagels, and two dozen scones and assorted rolls?

She is currently working on her pièce de résistance, a hanging mobile sculpture made of stainless steel and 100 pounds of carrot cake – a piece she hopes to display at KSC’s Thorne-Sagendorph Art Gallery. Balamuth says she’s hit a few snags with the project, but fortunately the Thorne does permit food in its function room. This was made possible by the Office of Sponsored Projects and Research through an Undergraduate Creative Project Grant.

Balamuth feels she has made the most of her college experience, challenging herself while keeping her professors on their toes with her constant quest to push the envelope and try different ways of doing things. “The Art Department and the professors at Keene State are a hidden jewel,” said Balamuth. “I have nothing but good things to say about the school.

“My first academic advisor was Henry Freedman. He really got me going. When he retired, I chose John Roberts to guide me and he was my rock for many years,” she added. “His expertise and knowledge in printmaking allows him to freely lecture and teach from the heart, demonstrating with gusto. He deserves recognition from me for his excellent counsel and I feel he upped my skill set in many important and marketable studio procedures.”

In the “better late than never” category, Balamuth said she enjoyed going back to school. “I appreciated it because I wanted it,” she said. “In the past, I was always the person who did for others. I put three kids through college and now it’s my turn and it feels deserved to me. I was chipping away at it and now it feels like, yes, I’m doing this.”

Balamuth now intends to take her newly acquired skill set back to the organic farm in Alstead that she and her husband hope to bring back to life. “Except for the learning curve, everything is in line to go,” she said.

And if she finds any free time between planting and harvesting, Balamuth hopes to continue her art pursuits in a recently finished barn. After all, what farm doesn’t need another sculpture?

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