He is a descendant of the Ngāti Awa ancestor Te Rangihouhiri and the founding chairman of Ngā Aho, a design initiative that advocates for collaborative and creative practices among professionals within the Māori tribal structure and community.
This absence in the availability of design/make training would have a subsequent influence on Wilson's agenda as president of the Crafts Council of New Zealand (CCNZ); in the meantime he honed his skills by doing.
His first major exhibition was in 1974 at the Canterbury Building Centre: a buyer from McKenzie & Willis, the furniture retailer, purchased the entire inventory of occasional tables, shelf units and cupboards.
As a consequence, Wilson established Adzmarc, rented a studio in the Artists Quarter in central Christchurch, hired employees, and made furniture in a rustic, textured style that was wholesaled to McKenzie & Willis for the next five years.
Wilson's report, as a consequence of this trip, for the Minister of the Arts, Allan Highet, was passed on to the Director-General of Education, William Renwick, thereby launching the process to establish the certificate and diploma programmes in craft design in polytechnics throughout the country in 1986 and 1987.
"[9] Wilson also collaborates with Rau Hoskins in teaching at Unitec Institute of Technology with assignments, like building shelters, that reflect the wisdom of indigenous materials and techniques.
John Parker (ceramics) and Terry Stringer (sculpture) provided segues to exhibition opportunities, and once his studio was established in Mount Eden, he continued to be a prolific and accomplished furniture maker.
[13] The primary example in Wilson's Artiture oeuvre was Royal Pain in the Arse, a chair whose literal pointed humour made reference to the Crown.
Also in the narrative vein, Lair for a Lounge Lizard, created for the Contemporary Furniture Show at the Auckland Museum in 1988, explored the new notion of the home office.
Lair was not selected for display in the Contemporary Furniture Show, prompting Wilson and other rejected designers to stage a salon de refusés at the Gow Langsford Gallery.
[14] The publicity generated by the furore surrounding the Australian judge's selection contributed to the Auckland Museum exhibition and its alternative being noteworthy events in the history of New Zealand studio furniture.
[16] Although there have been regional exhibitions[17] and gallery shows dedicated to individual makers,[18] Framed spelled the end of national visibility for studio furniture.
At the conclusion of the hearings Wilson began work on his first solo exhibition of sculpture, He Rahi to Whakamau kotahi i te Pirita, which translates as ‘to be entangled in the supplejack [a twisted vine Ripogonum scandens] once is sufficient.’ This statement is attributed to the prophetic figure Te Kooti as he reflected on his experience of dealing with the Crown during this period in New Zealand history.
[20] "I O E A U" at Artis Gallery in Auckland in 2003 transferred the marks made by Māori signatories to the Treaty of Waitangi, into three-dimensional forms in steel, wood glass and stone.