On Oct. 3, 2024, designer Gottfried Pilz died at the age of 80.

The Deutsche Oper Berlin announced the news noting that the company “will honor his memory and his work.”

Born on Sept. 21, 1944, in Salzburg, Austria, Pilz became a designer for opera and theatre productions and worked at many leading opera houses in the world.

During his lifetime Pilz said his work “was not about decoration, but about making visible what was behind a wall, what lay beyond the boundaries.”

He got his star in the theater in the early 70s as assistant to Filippo Sanjust and as a designer for several productions including the 1971 premiere of Aribert Reimann’s “Melusine.” Pilz went on to work with German director Götz Friedrich and was responsible, among others, for productions such as “Der Rosenlavalier,” “Un Ballo in Maschera,” “Boris Gounov” and the last Friedrich premiere “Amahl and the Night Visitors.”

He also collaborated with Director John Dew, with whom Pliz worked from 1980 to 1990. Pliz’s wife Isabel Ines Glather also became the Costume Designer for his sets.

Pilz had a long history with the Deutsche Oper Berlin where he designed 18 productions including “The Huguenots,” Poulenc’s “Dialogues des Carmelites” and Enescu’s “Oepide.” He also worked in the Vienna, Berlin, Dresden, London, New York, and Moscow,

Two weeks ago, Pilz was in his adopted home of Berlin for an event in honor of his 80th birthday, at which a book about him and his work was presented.