Film Review
Robert Wilson, Center Stage

Absolute Wilson
Directed by Katharina Otto-Bernstein

By LESTER GRAY
Arts Editor

At this time of year the movie industry goes into a type of hibernation, the movers and shakers emerging from their burrows on the night of the Academy Awards. Should they see their shadows (in sunny L.A.), we’re in for a few more weeks of less-than-stellar releases. Hence it’s an opportune time to visit the so-called art houses and explore less mainstream offerings. Foremost among such offerings in town is Absolute Wilson, a retrospective on the life and work of living artist Robert Wilson.

In the last half of the 20th century, when poetry lost rhyme, paintings lost discernable figures, and melody became inimical to music, membership in the avant-garde movement was open. It was difficult, even for the most informed aficionados, to distinguish the pretenders. But when the chaff inevitably blew away, Robert Wilson emerged in full splendor.

When shoehorned into categorization, Mr. Wilson is known most frequently as a stage director, a choreographer, and most often as a playwright. The tools and forms of his creative expression, however, are without boundary. What Absolute Wilson attempts and accomplishes about as well as any vehicle could is to capture an artist whose processes are as elusive as the results they yield.

Robert Wilson intuits what most of us do not. That much is clear. The dimension to which he is privy is neither whimsical nor capricious. And when, through his works, he opens the door into his personal and intimate esthetic, those who experience it testify to its potency.

Interviewed in the film, the artist offers clues to the origins of his singular vision. As a child he was slow to learn, embarrassingly so. In retrospect he attributes this to a degree of autism. He nonetheless possessed an intelligence that allowed him to study law long enough to know that it wasn’t his calling.

Arguably, his best known work, Einstein on the Beach, on which he collaborated with composer Phillip Glass, catapulted him into the world of authenticity, which meant that even those who did not understand his work could safely rave about it. Most importantly, this imprimatur led to underwriting so critical for the large productions he seems to favor.

Robert Wilson is not your stereotypical postmodern celebrity artist. He does not advertise himself through public eccentricity, either sartorially or by any affectation. Despite the fact that he mocks his Texas origins, he is in so many ways the quintessential Southern gentleman. In a suit and tie, this handsome man delivers a cloying “Yes ma’am” with the best of them — a useful asset in fundraising.

For those in the Northwest, many of whom have never had the opportunity to experience a Robert Wilson production, Absolute Wilson is the hors d’oeuvre, whetting the appetite. For those fortunate enough to have experienced the entrée, the film becomes a rich dessert.