Biography
Born in Chicago in 1940, Gladys Nilsson studied painting at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She first came to prominence in 1966, when she joined five other recent Art Institute graduates (Jim Falconer, Art Green, Jim Nutt, Suellen Rocca, and Karl Wirsum) for the first of a series of group exhibitions called the Hairy Who. In 1973, she became one of the first women to have a solo-exhibition at the Whitney Museum of American Art. In 1990, she accepted a teaching position at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, where she is now a professor.
Nilsson is known for her densely layered and meticulously constructed watercolors and collages. Like many of the Hairy Who artists, Nilsson employed a type of horror vacui; many of her works feel filled to the brim with winding, playful imagery. Her work often focuses on aspects of human sexuality and its inherent contradictions.
Since 1966, Nilsson’s work has been the subject of over 50 solo exhibitions, including sixteen at Phyllis Kind Gallery (1970–1979, 1981–1983, 1987, 1991, and 1994, Chicago and New York), and two at The Candy Store (1971 and 1987, Folsom, California). She is the subject of Gladys Nilsson: Gleefully Askew, a major retrospective currently on view at the Crocker Art Museum (2026) and traveling to the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art (2027). Her work has also been featured in many important museum exhibitions, such as: Human Concern/Personal Torment (1969, Whitney Museum of American Art); Who Chicago? (1981, Camden Art Center, London); Parallel Visions: Modern Artists and Outsider Art (1992, Los Angeles County Museum of Art); and Chicago Imagists (2011, Madison Museum of Contemporary Art, Wisconsin); and What Nerve! Alternative Figures in American Art, 1960 to the Present (2014, Museum of Art, Rhode Island School of Design, Providence).
Nilsson’s work is featured in the collections of major museums around the world, including: the Art Institute of Chicago; the Courtauld Gallery, London, United Kingdom; the Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento, California; the Los Angeles County Museum of Art; the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art, Wisconsin; the Milwaukee Art Museum; the Morgan Library, New York; the Museum Moderner Kunst, Vienna; the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; the Museum of Modern Art; the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia; the Philadelphia Museum of Art; the Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, D.C.; the Whitney Museum of American Art; and the Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, Connecticut.
Exhibitions
Press
October 8, 2026
Gladys Nilsson Retrospective Reviewed in the New York Review of Books (opens in new tab)
October 7, 2026
Gladys Nilsson Profiled in the Chicago Reader
August 12, 2026
Gladys Nilsson Retrospective Reviewed in Observer
July 29, 2026
Gladys Nilsson Retrospective Featured in Harper’s Bazaar
July 15, 2026
Gladys Nilsson in Vogue
June 1, 2026
Gladys Nilsson: Gleefully Askew Featured in Artforum
December 30, 2025
Gladys Nilsson in the Chicago Sun Times
September 5, 2025
Gladys Nilsson at The Menil Drawing Institute
February 4, 2025
Gladys Nilsson in Elephant Magazine
November 20, 2024
Gladys Nilsson Awarded “Anonymous Was A Woman” Grant
October 22, 2024
Gladys Nilsson in the Boston Art Review
June 24, 2024
Alive & Kicking: Fantastic Installations by Thomas Lanigan-Schmidt, Catalina Schliebener Muñoz, and Gladys Nilsson
February 1, 2023
Gladys Nilsson Reviewed in Artforum
November 23, 2022
Gladys Nilsson Reviewed in New City Art
August 28, 2020
Gladys Nilsson Interviewed on The Woven Tale Press
March 5, 2020
Gladys Nilsson Featured in Isthmus
March 1, 2020
Gladys Nilsson Interviewed in The Brooklyn Rail
February 26, 2020
Gladys Nilsson Reviewed in the New York Times
February 26, 2020
Gladys Nilsson Reviewed in The New Yorker
February 21, 2020
Gladys Nilsson Interviewed in Interview Magazine
February 21, 2020
Gladys Nilsson Reviewed on Artnet News
February 15, 2020
Gladys Nilsson Reviewed on Hyperallergic
February 3, 2020
Gladys Nilsson Reviewed in The Art Newspaper
January 30, 2020
Gladys Nilsson Interviewed in The New York Times
November 26, 2019
Gladys Nilsson Featured in New City Brazil News
July 5, 2019
Gladys Nilsson Featured in The New York Times
June 10, 2019
Jaune Quick-to-See Smith and Gladys Nilsson Featured in UC Davis News
March 29, 2019
Gladys Nilsson Featured in Studio International
March 27, 2019
Art Green and Gladys Nilsson Featured in Cool Hunting
March 22, 2019
Art Green and Gladys Nilsson Featured in Frieze Magazine
March 18, 2019
Art Green and Gladys Nilsson Featured in The Guardian
March 15, 2019
Art Green and Gladys Nilsson Featured in the Art Newspaper
March 15, 2019
Art Green and Gladys NIlsson Featured in Contemporary Art Society
February 15, 2019
Gladys Nilsson Featured in The Brooklyn Rail
December 13, 2018
Art Green and Gladys Nilsson Featured in New York Times
December 1, 2018
Art Green and Gladys Nilsson Featured in Hyperallergic
October 30, 2018
Art Green and Gladys Nilsson Featured in Chicago Magazine
October 23, 2018
Art Green and Gladys Nilsson Featured in The Daily Gazette
October 4, 2018
Art Green and Gladys Nilsson Featured in The Chicago Maroon
October 1, 2018
Art Green and Gladys Nilsson Featured in ArtNews
September 29, 2018
Art Green and Gladys Nilsson Featured in the Chicago Reader
September 26, 2018
Art Green and Gladys Nilsson Featured in Artsy
September 26, 2018
Art Green and Gladys Nilsson Featured in the Chicago Reader
September 25, 2018
Art Green and Gladys Nilsson Featured in TimeOut Chicago
September 24, 2018
Art Green and Gladys Nilsson Featured in the Art Newspaper
September 22, 2018
Art Green and Gladys Nilsson Featured in the Chicago Sun Times
August 30, 2018
Gladys Nilsson Featured in New City Art
July 3, 2018
Gladys Nilsson Reviewed in LA Times
March 2, 2018
Gladys Nilsson Featured in Artnet
January 30, 2018
Gladys Nilsson and Howardena Pindell Featured in Wall Street Journal
January 29, 2018
Gladys Nilsson Featured in The Art Newspaper
October 18, 2017
Art Green and Gladys Nilsson Featured on BLOUIN ARTINFO
April 4, 2017
Art Green and Gladys Nilsson Featured on Artnet
April 4, 2017
Gladys Nilsson Featured in Artnet News
April 3, 2017
Art Green and Gladys Nilsson Featured in The New York Times
April 1, 2017
Gladys Nilsson: The 1980s Reviewed in Art in America
April 1, 2017
Gladys Nilsson: The 1980s Reviewed in ArtReview
February 27, 2017
Gladys Nilsson and Art Green Featured in Smithsonian Magazine
February 5, 2017
Gladys Nilsson Reviewed on Hyperallergic
January 17, 2017
Gladys Nilsson Featured in Art News
January 13, 2017
Gladys Nilsson Featured on TimeOut
January 4, 2017
Gladys Nilsson Featured on Artspace
June 15, 2016
Garth Greenan Gallery Announces Relocation
January 6, 2015
Gladys Nilsson Featured in The Huffington Post
December 22, 2014
Gladys Nilsson Reviewed on Art Monkey Wrench
December 11, 2014
Gladys Nilsson Reviewed in The New York Times
December 10, 2014
Gladys Nilsson Reviewed in The Huffington Post
November 24, 2014
Gladys Nilsson Interviewed in The Paris Review
November 23, 2014
Gladys Nilsson Reviewed on Hyperallergic
September 25, 2014
Gladys Nilsson Featured in The New York Times
