Robert Wilson. Planetary Performing Arts

PEDRO VALIENTE

Recommended Book by Casa del Libro Madrid I Top 10 Performing Arts Books by Librería Alibri I Barcelona Published by Ñaque Ed.

Robert Wilson. Planetary Performing Arts (2005) is the first part of a book series on Robert Wilson’s work followed by the upcoming Suspended Time Space. Robert Wilson’s Creative Process. Both are based on the PhD dissertation Study of Robert Wilson’s Creative Process.

Robert Wilson. Planetary Performing Arts with focus on interdiscilinary work and comparative study.

Photo: Deafman Glance: Peter Moore I © RW Work Ltd.

the WATERMILL CENTER

ROBERT WILSON

“I have never told an actor ‘this means that.’ I create a very strict structure as far as choreography is concerned, I am strict when I give directions for movement, but not thought. The directions I give, if I give them, to the actors, are about them being more inward, faster or slower– formalistic directions. ‘Quieter,’ ‘Stronger,’ ‘Faster,’ ‘Pull that.’ I don’t discuss with the actors what they say on stage or what they think. Sometimes I tell them: You believe too much in what you are saying and so you are not believable”

— Robert Wilson I The Vima, 2001

“I arrived at Robert Wilson’s world by chance —perhaps in the same way that men and women stumble upon great discoveries in life. I arrived with the transparent innocence that only tireless travelers possess, driven by the desire to explore extraordinary territories of the mind and spirit.

Fate led me to New York, where academic research brought me closer to one of the true geniuses of contemporary performing and visual arts. I admire Robert Wilson’s work and feel privileged to have been —even in the smallest way— a part of his creative process. But this book is neither a tribute nor an exercise in blind adulation. I have made every effort to avoid excessive personalization of judgments, steering clear of uncritical praise.

Instead, I use Wilson’s work as a gateway to explore contemporary arts. Few artists, like this visionary director from Texas, have ventured so fearlessly across multiple disciplines —avant-garde theater, modern opera, contemporary dance, visual art, and audiovisual technology. He approaches each with generosity and honesty, always guided by a multicultural perspective, an experimental spirit, and a fusion of languages that define 20th century art: uncertain, hybrid, and global.

For readers eager to explore avant-garde art beyond a single figure, I hope this journey through Wilson’s work serves as an enriching path. And yet, I still wonde —why are there so few books about Robert Wilson? Aside from the lavish, oversized volumes that grace coffee tables, where are the in-depth explorations? But then again, when dealing with the theater of images, who needs printed words? At least Picasso had better luck..” —Pedro Valiente [Translated from book’s prologue] I Photo: Einstein on the Beach: Lucie Jansch I © RW Work Ltd

A Journey Through the Avant-Garde

Photo: *Einstein on the Beach*: Lucie Jansch I © RW Work Ltd.

Einstein on the Beach (1976 ) by Philip Glass and Robert Wilson

ABSTRACT *Robert Wilson. Arte escémico planetario* (2005) I Avant-garde: Symbolism, Expressionism, Dadaism, Surrealism, Theater of the Absurd. I Visionaries: Alfred Jarry, Adolph Appia, Edward Gordon Craig, Oscar Schlemmer, Vsevolod Meyerhold, Erwin Piscator. Authors: Samuel Beckett, Tadeusz Kantor. Masters: Martha Graham, Merce Cunningham. I Aesthetic: Experimentation, postmodernity, multimedia, interdisciplinary, multicultural, ecological, oriental. I Artistic disciplines: performing arts, visual arts, film/media. I Creative process: scenic techniques, voice/sound, text/composition, performance/movement, light/costume, space/time, *mise-en-escene*, total theater. I Photo: *Einstein on the Beach*: Lucie Jansch I © RW Work Ltd.

The Days Before DDDIII

Books I PhD I Theater

“A six-hundred-page essay took shape as a PhD dissertation —an exploration of contemporary art within the framework of the avant-garde. For decades, Robert Wilson has been recognized as a maverick of opera staging, with acclaimed productions commissioned primarily by opera houses in Paris and Berlin. Yet, at his core, Wilson is a theater auteur —a director whose true medium is movement.

Beyond the stage, Wilson has built an extensive body of visual work, spanning drawings, paintings, furniture design, video art, and site installations. He is the master of light in the performing arts of the 20th century and beyond. Deeply influenced by Martha Graham, he follows in the experimental tradition of Black Mountain College, alongside figures like painter Robert Rauschenberg and composer John Cage. He is also a defining presence in the iconic book The Theater of Images, alongside Richard Foreman and Mabou Mines.

Wilson belongs to a singular generation that stormed New York in the late 1960s, forging groundbreaking artistic languages that continue to shape contemporary art today. Among his extraordinary collaborators are writers Heiner Müller and William S. Burroughs, and musicians Philip Glass, Lou Reed, and Tom Waits. I could not have immersed myself for years in any other world. And beyond my dream of living in New York and studying filmmaking, it was Wilson’s work that drew me here.” —Pedro Valiente

The Theater of Images

RECOMMENDED BOOK by Casa del Libro, Madrid I TOP 10 PERFORMING ARTS BOOKS by Librería Alibri, Barcelona

PRAISE

Book in DRAMA TECHNIQUE series with authors Ian Watson and José Sanchis Sinisterra. Ñaque Ed. Fernando Bercebal director, Cristina M. Ruiz Pérez designer.