He died at his home in Water Mill, New York.

Born in Waco, Texas, Wilson was the son of Loree Velma and D.M. Wilson and had a difficult youth as the gay son of a conservative family. After school, he attended the University of Texas for business administration and later moved to Brooklyn, New York, in 1963 to study art and architecture.

The director was influenced by choreographers George Balanchine, Merce Cunningham, and Martha Graham and received a BFA in architecture from the Pratt Institute.

In 1968, Wilson founded an experimental performance company, the Byrd Hoffman School of Byrds, and directed major works including “The King of Spain” and “The Life and Times of Sigmund Freud.”

Wilson would start working in opera in the 1970s, creating “Einstein on the Beach” with composer Philip Glass and choreographer Lucinda Childs. That work brought him acclaim, and he would end up working with major opera companies in the world, including the Metropolitan Opera, Lithuanian National Opera, Teatro alla Scala, Teatro dell’Opera di Roma, Paris Opera, Zurich Opera, Houston Grand Opera, Teatro Real de Madrid, LA Opera, Bolshoi Theatre,, Polish National Opera, Dutch National Opera, and many more.

Wilson, alongside choreographer Andy deGroat and the dancer and actor Sheryl Sutton, created the “silent opera,” “Deafman Glance” in 1970 and premiered it at the Center for New Performing Arts. The work would later be performed in New York and France.

In theater, Wilson was also famous for his productions of Shakespeare’s “King Lear,” Anton Chekhov’s “Swansong,”  Virginia Woolf’s “Orlando,” and “The Black Rider,” August Strindberg’s “A Dream Play,” and many more. He worked in the United States, Sweden, Germany, Russia, and the United Kingdom, among others.

He also collaborated on film projects, including the documentary feature film “Absolute Wilson,” chronicling his life, times, and creativity. The film screened at the Berlin Film Festival.

Aside from his work on stage, Wilson was also a sculptor and created drawings and furniture designs. He exhibited his work at the Paula Cooper Gallery and at the Venice Biennale, where he won the Golden Lion.

He also designed an art park dedicated to the Finnish designer Tapio Wirkkala and collaborated with Lady Gaga as part of her ARTPOP project. He designed the set for her 2013 MTV Video Music Awards performance and worked with her on the Voom Portraits.

Wilson’s productions were known for pushing the boundaries and for their austere style. The works included very slow movement and often extreme scale in space or in time. In an interview with OperaWire in 2019, Wilson spoke about his style and said, “A stage is unlike any other space. I hate naturalism. To be on stage is something artificial. And if you try to act naturally, it seems artificial. But if you accept it as something artificial, it becomes more natural.”

He added, “Every singer, every actor has to stay on a stage. And you should learn to stand by standing. Then learn to walk by walking. This work is formal. And how you stand is essential. It deals with movement and stillness.”

Among the many projects that Wilson was also known for was The Watermill Center on the site of a former Western Union laboratory on the East End of Long Island, New York.