56 | SEPTEMBER 12 • 2024 
J
N

H

edy Blatt and Gary 
Wasserman do not know 
each other, but they 
expressed similar feelings of sur-
prise when individually learning 
about being chosen as recipients of 
this year’s Birmingham Bloomfield 
Cultural Arts Awards.
It is the 29th year of community 
recognition for artists, patrons, volun-
teers and boosters.
While Blatt was recognized for 
leading educational arts initiatives 
in Oakland County, Wasserman was 
cited for various lifetime achieve-
ments that reached inside Michigan 
and outside to California, Florida, 
Israel and beyond.
The honorees, who will each 
receive a specially designed plaque 
and a personalized bracelet, will have 
their names placed on a permanent 
plaque affixed on the wall of the 
Birmingham City Hall. Awards will 
be given at a reception scheduled by 
the main sponsor, Cultural Council 
of Birmingham/Bloomfield, for 
Friday, Sept. 13, at the Birmingham 
Bloomfield Art Center.
Honorees were chosen after formal 
nominations were reviewed by a jury.
“I was absolutely surprised and hon-
ored,
” said Blatt, who retired this June 
as fine arts consultant for Oakland 
Schools, where she connected teachers 
and students with community arts 
organizations to enhance programs in 
music, theater and the fine arts. 
“It’s wonderful to be recognized, but 
even more important, it’s wonderful 
to have the arts recognized in such a 
meaningful way. We are one of 56 enti-
ties throughout the state of Michigan, 
generally county-wide, that assist 
schools and provide services to schools 
on a variety kind of basis.
“My work has often focused on 
teacher training and offering confer-
ences to teachers and thereby reaching 
their students. We’ve partnered with all 
of the major cultural entities in Metro 
Detroit.
”
Blatt, who lives in Bloomfield 
Township and whose family holds 
membership in Temple Israel, became 
interested in the arts through piano 
music she studied at Interlochen Arts 

Academy for eight weeks when she was 
8 years old. She began her 40+ years of 
an arts career as a music teacher. 
“I, at first, felt it was my job to have 
parents come to concerts to entertain 
them,
” she said. “Now, I would look 
at it differently. When I was fine arts 
director in Troy, overseeing all of the 
art, I became enamored with visual art 
because I can’t do it. 
“I saw what was happening in the 
art classroom that nobody saw. In 
some cases, they didn’t do art shows or 
public displays of student art, and that 
started me down the road to getting 
it out of the classroom and into the 
public domain so that people could see 
phenomenal, talented kids that may or 
may not have been in the mainstream.
”
Blatt, who plans to give more time to 
playing golf and studying cake decora-
tion arts, has a message for parents.
“It’s my hope that parents advocate 
for quality arts education in their 
schools,
” she said. “That is what a 

quality district should have. It offers 
students so much, especially students 
who might be struggling.
” 
Wasserman, CEO of Allied Metals 
Corp. centered in Auburn Hills, has 
two current Metro Detroit arts con-
nections. They include Wasserman 
Projects in the territory of Eastern 
Market, which is a presentation space 
for different talents. Also important to 
him is Detroit Opera. Board member-
ships have reached from the Detroit 
Symphony Orchestra to Cranbrook. 
With service to many types of orga-
nizations, Wasserman can trace his 
interest in the arts back to his teen 
years after receiving a small inheritance 
from a grandmother. 
“I thought I should do something 
with the money so I always think of 
her,
” Wasserman said. “I bought a 
Steuben crystal object that was a gold 
mouse on crystal Swiss cheese. That 
was my first art purchase, and that is 
still on my desk today, which is plus-60 

years.
” A fine arts collection started 
in his 20s.
“The arts have brought me a great 
deal of inspiration and stimulation 
because of the contact with people 
who are creators and thinkers and 
often live outside of conventional 
thinking,
” he said. “I truly enjoy the 
beauty and the underpinnings of it.
”
Wasserman said that his favorite 
outreach has been supporting the 
annual America’s Thanksgiving 
Parade, conducted in Detroit with 
television broadcasts. His direct 
involvement, helping the parade 
overcome some difficult issues, was 
between 1988 and 1998.

Wasserman’s business takes him to 
locations in other cities and countries 
so he maintains several residences. 
As his son joins him in that business, 
he makes time for activities linked to 
Jewish-based arts organizations.
Reaching outside Michigan, those 
include the International Institute for 
Secular Humanistic Judaism based in 
Israel and Miami New Drama based in 
Florida and founded by Venezuelan 
Jewish refugees who had to leave their 
country because of antisemitism. 
With Reboot, centered in New York 
and having work set in other cities, 
he is supporting a theater project that 
involves productions about antisem-
itism, and he hopes to bring produc-
tions into Michigan.
“
Artistry is an essential part of the 
fabric that creates a vibrant part of 
community,
” Wasserman said. “It 
brings a certain intellectual and emo-
tional investment to a community that 
strengthen that community. 
“In Detroit, in its most dire days, 
it was the cultural infrastructure that 
held the city together such that it 
provided the nodes that were able to 
generate the beginnings, maintain the 
interest and anchor the creation of 
the new urban experience that today 
Detroit has become.
“It has been a wonderful way for 
me to engage with a community and 
people that I otherwise would not have 
known, and I feel that I am contrib-
uting something of myself over and 
above just monetary contributions.
” 

ARTS&LIFE
ART

Two Jewish community members 
recognized with Birmingham Bloomfield 
Cultural Arts Awards.

Art Honorees
Art Honorees

SUZANNE CHESSLER CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Gary 
Wasserman

Details
The Birmingham Bloomfield Cultural Arts Awards will be 
presented 5:30-7:30 p.m. Friday, Sept. 13, during a free program 
at the Birmingham Bloomfield Art Center, 1516 S. Cranbrook Road, 
Birmingham. (248) 644-0866. culturalcouncilbirminghambloomfield.
org.

Hedy Blatt 

