Language is the Barrier of the Imagination: the Work of Bob Wilson

by Drew Martin
I just finished watching a great documentary about Bob Wilson called Absolute Wilson. The first name that comes to mind with Einstein on the Beach is Philip Glass, who composed the music for this epic work, but Wilson was the mastermind behind the production, and it is said that it was the first opera created around stage sets (by Wilson). He also collaborated with David Byrne, Laurie Anderson, Tom Waits, and William S. Burroughs, and threw himself into grand pieces, such as KA MOUNTain and GUARDenia Terrace, the seven-day play he put on atop a mountain in Iran in 1972.