Robert Wilson—The Early Years

DALLAS PRATT
 

In 1965, when he was still a student of architecture at Pratt Insti¬
tute, Robert Wilson was brought by a friend to my house for
drinks. He was about twenty-four years old. Very courteous,
neatly dressed, with nothing whatever bohemian in his appearance:
one might have assumed he was preparing to enter a conservative
New York architectural firm. However, he mentioned that the kind
of architecture he was interested in was stage design; in fact, he had
already designed an off-Broadway production, Jean-Claude van Ital-
lie s America Hurrah. Although there were twenty-seven years differ¬
ence in age between us, he was very amiable and arranged for me to
meet several of his friends.

After he graduated from Pratt, he rented a loft on Spring Street in
New York's Soho, and in 1966 invited me to several performances
there in which he danced, either alone or with a partner. Here was a
very different Robert Wilson from the proper young man I had met
at the cocktail party! On one occasion, in an incense-scented room he
danced under phosphorescent light encased m transparent red-dyed
plastic. In another production, Byrdwoman, the performers repre¬
sented chickens, bouncing on boards and pressing against the wire of
a large chicken coop. Bob swooped about with lurchmg, half-spastic
steps, clucking. In later productions he continued to fascinate audi¬
ences with these movements. He claimed that he hated doing them
"but I can't seem to stop."

I was in the audience of Bob's Theater Activity shown at the
Bleecker Street Cinema in 1967. He "papered" the audience with
some of his friends, literally, since he persuaded them to sit with
brown paper bags over their heads, peering through cut-out eyeholes.

Opposite: Robert Wilson dancing during the Entre'acte between Acts

II and III in A Letter for Queen Victoria. 1974.

(Photo by Michel Biannoulatos)