Gary Wasserman
Global business owner, cultural producer and philanthropist, Gary Wasserman, lends his time and expertise to many organizations and affiliations. So it seems fitting that he recently received a Special Lifetime Achievement Award as a “creative visionary” from the Cultural Council of Birmingham-Bloomfield.
As CEO of Allied Metals Corporation, Wasserman has become a leader in the technology of high purity materials for the aerospace and energy generation industries. Through his involvement in the community, he led the revitalization of America's Thanksgiving Day Parade in Detroit and served on the boards of Detroit Opera, Detroit Symphony Orchestra and Cranbrook Educational Community. Other affiliations include the boards of The Detroit Eastern Market, The Knights NYC Orchestra, Ojai Music Festival, M:X Miami, The Wolfsonian FIU, Cleveland Orchestra Miami, presenter of The Big Apple Circus, and The Lincoln Center Chamber Music Society of Miami.
Raised in Detroit, Wasserman moved to Birmingham as a teen. He now divides his time between Metamora, New York City, Germany and Miami.
“They all feel like home,” said Wasserman, who rode horses with his siblings as a kid. “We were on horses practically before we walked. We were learning to be show riders. We competed and I still do, but I do carriage driving more than I ride now.”
His recent award had him thinking about his past and the impact it had on his pursuits. “It all comes from a common thread. We always traveled a lot and I continued traveling. I’ve always been beguiled by cities. I loved them as a child and I loved the Thanksgiving parade.
“In my family, on Thanksgiving we were supposed to go fox hunting, but I wanted to stay home and watch the Hudson’s and Macy’s parades. On Thanksgiving, Detroit was a city like New York. We had better floats and they had better balloons.”
That passion would have a lasting effect.
“That was really my leap into so many interests that have to do with cities and the fabric that creates a city,” he noted. “To a certain extent, that thread had to do with my business because it put us in cities around the world.”
His fascination would also aid the Detroit parade when it was in trouble in the late '80s.
Wasserman led the revitalization with the popular Hob Nobble Gobble fundraiser that started with 300 people at the event and grew to 2,500. “It became not only a huge financial component, but also attracted even more corporate sponsors and got the parade back on CBS,” he said.
Wasserman also became very involved in the Detroit Opera when David DiChiera was the general director. “It was David’s urbanism that drew me to it; it’s not so much the art form that gets me excited, as it is the urban element of it. When he passed away, I thought, ‘I’m done,’ but the most important part was the renovation of the dilapidated building into a major opera house and David had the courage and the vision,” he said. Now, with Yuval Sharon as artistic director, Wasserman said Detroit Opera is considered a major innovator in the U.S.
Another passion has been Wasserman Projects – an exhibition space and art gallery in the tradition of a kunsthalle, which facilitates and promotes the work of visual artists, musicians and spoken word performers.
“It was a way I felt we could contribute best to the vitality of Detroit as a growing creative community,” he said.
“I spent so much time in Germany and this form of art gallery is a hybrid. It’s a non-collecting museum and we do not represent artists, but we do present exhibitions. To be part of Eastern Market has been great and the benefit of being surrounded by all these creative people helps create more of a community in the city.”
Story: Jeanine Matlow
Photo: Donald Dietz
