Bent, Cast & Forged, Harry Bertoia, Cranbrook Museum of Art  

Last night we attended the opening of the Exhibition of Harry Bertoia's first venture: Jewelry, called "Bent, Cast & Forged" at the Cranbrook Museum of Art.  It was a fantastic evening and opened with a talk by Celia Bertoia to a packed auditorium. It was exceptionally informative whereby the origins of his thoughts and ideas were shown, and insight as to Harry as a family man were revealed.The presentation was top-notch in keeping with what we have seen as a constant standard from Cranbrook and the exhibition catalog is stunning. The pieces on display dated from 1935 - there were 30 on display. All of them were brilliant but the show stopper had to be the centipede he created - much larger than it looks in the photos.It will be on-going until late November and is well worth seeing, the pieces while labeled as jewelry truly are sculptures and you can see the influences of his origins reflected strongly in his sculptures and even his chairs for Knoll that came later.The following day we were fortunate enough to spend time with several of the family members and see a remarkable piece not part of the exhibition - an ink by Bertoia owned by the family that was performed by Harry as part of his submission for admission to Cass Technical High School or the Detroit Society of Arts and Crafts. It showed just how talented he was from the word go, the detail and complexity really indicated to educators early on that he was never going to be a normal student and had a real gift. We also were able to see several monotypes from him...I would plaster every wall with them all if I had the chance, they are brilliant, but the ink was especially telling although unlike anything we know of Harry today.The staff at Cranbrook & Bertoia's family (especially Celia) have done such a brilliant presentation of Harry Bertoia and his work in Jewelry, it just could not have been better.