Gladys Nilsson
Born in Chicago, to Swedish immigrant parents, 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 New York. In 1990, she accepted a teaching position at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, where she is now a professor.
Nilsson grew up on the north side of Chicago and went to Lake View High School, while also attending extracurricular drawing classes. Nilsson later attended the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (1958-1962), where she met her future husband, fellow student Jim Nutt (born 1938). Nilsson and Nutt married in July 1961, and their son, Claude, was born the following year. Although Nilsson originally used oil paints, she switched to watercolours when pregnant in order to avoid the potential health hazards of turpentine.
In 1964, Jim Nutt and Gladys Nilsson began to teach children’s classes at the Hyde Park Art Center in Chicago. The pair (together with fellow artist James Falconer) approached the center’s exhibitions director, Don Baum, with the idea of a group show consisting of the three of them together with Art Green and Suellen Rocca. Baum agreed, and also suggested they include Karl Wirsum. The name of the group show, Hairy Who?, became the name of the group. It was coined by Karl Wirsum as a reference to WFMT art critic Harry Bouras. They exhibited at the Hyde Park Art Center in 1966, 1967, 1968, and 1969. The 1968 exhibition also travelled to the San Francisco Art Institute, San Francisco, California, and the last show, in 1969, travelled to the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, DC.
In 1969, Chicago gallery owner Phyllis Kind agreed to represent Nilsson and Nutt, giving both of them their first solo shows. The same year, the couple moved to Sacramento, California, where Nutt worked as an assistant professor of art atSacramento State College. In 1973, Nilsson became the first Hairy Who member to have a solo show at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York (a bittersweet experience since two of her paintings were stolen from the show). The following year, Nilsson and her family returned to Chicago, moving to Wilmette, Illinois (where they still remain today) in 1976.
Though she has mostly painted with watercolours on paper, Nilsson has also worked with collage. In her later work, Nilsson cut out imagery from fashion magazines in an exploration of ideals of feminine beauty.
In the spring of 2010, Nilsson was honoured with a large retrospective of her art at the Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art in Chicago.
Recently her work has also been featured in Gleefully Askew: A Gladys Nilsson Retrospective, at the Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento, California, U.S.A. (2026). The introduction to the exhibition (including 100 works covering her entire 60-year-plus career), set to travel in 2027 to the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art in Wisconsin, U.S.A. read as follows:
Born in Chicago in 1940, Gladys Nilsson is best known for her watercolors of long-limbed figures engaged in everyday micro-dramas. As a member of Chicago’s Hairy Who in the 1960s, Nilsson made watercolors that earned her a reputation as the most “feminine” member of the group—a characterization that she has challenged and spoofed throughout her career. Now in her 80s, Nilsson continues to actively work in her studio, creating surprising new works that revisit familiar themes with even greater aplomb, fluidity, and mischievousness. Nilsson’s long-overdue first museum retrospective will reunite her watercolors, paintings, drawings, collages, and prints from critical moments in her 60-year career, including her early Hairy Who years, her radical experiments while living in Sacramento between 1968 and 1976, and her irreverent and delightful recent works that explore ageing bodies.
Nilsson’s work is widely represented in various public collections like: Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A.; Brauer Museum of Art, Valparaiso University, Valparaiso, Indiana, U.S.A.; Kresge Art Museum, Michigan State University, Lansing, Michigan, U.S.A.; Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, California, U.S.A.; Madison Museum of Contemporary Art, Madison, Wisconsin, U.S.A.; Maier Museum of Art at Randolph College, Lynchburg, Virginia, U.S.A.; Mary and Leigh Block Museum of Art, Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois, U.S.A.; Midwest Museum of American Art, Elkhart, Indiana, U.S.A.; Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, U.S.A.; Morgan Library, New York, New York, U.S.A.; Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A.; Museum of Modern Art, New York, New York, U.S.A.; Museum Moderner Kunst, Vienna; New Orleans Museum of Art, New Orleans, Louisiana, U.S.A.; Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.A.; Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.A.; Phoenix Art Museum, Phoenix, Arizona, U.S.A.; Roger Brown Study Collection, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A.; Sheldon Museum of Art, University of Nebraska, Lincoln, Nebraska, U.S.A.; Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington D.C., U.S.A.; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, New York, U.S.A.; and Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, Connecticut, U.S.A.
Nilsson has shown her work in numerous solo exhibitions like Gladys Nilsson, Marjorie Dell Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1966); Gladys Nilsson, Clay Street Gallery, San Francisco Art Institute, San Francisco, California, U.S.A. (1969); Gladys Nilsson, Candy Store Gallery, Folsom, California, U.S.A. (1971); Gladys Nilsson, Art Gallery, Chico State College, Chico, California, U.S.A. (1971); Gladys Nilsson, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, New York, U.S.A. (1973); Gladys Nilsson, Portland Center for the Visual Arts, Portland, Oregon, U.S.A. (1979); Gladys Nilsson, Survey of Works on Paper, 1967–1979, Fine Arts Gallery, Wake Forest University, Winston-Salem, North Carolina, U.S.A. (1979-1980); Gladys Nilsson, Survey of Works on Paper, 1967–1979, Art Gallery, Corpus Christi State University, Corpus Christi, Texas, U.S.A. (1979-1980); Gladys Nilsson, Survey of Works on Paper, 1967–1979, Wustum Museum of Fine Arts, Racine, Wisconsin, U.S.A. (1979-1980); Gladys Nilsson, Phyllis Kind Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1983); Gladys Nilsson, Greatest Hits from Chicago, Selected Works 1967–1984, Randolph Street Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1984); Gladys Nilsson, Galerie Bonnier, Geneva, Switzerland (1985); Gladys Nilsson, Phyllis Kind Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1987); Gladys Nilsson, Phyllis Kind Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (1987); Gladys Nilsson, Phyllis Kind Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1991); Gladys Nilsson, Janet Fleisher Gallery, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.A. (1991); Gladys Nilsson, Ovsey Gallery, Los Angeles, California, U.S.A. (1992); Gladys Nilsson, Xochipilli Gallery, Birmingham, Michigan, U.S.A. (1992); Gladys Nilsson, Janet Fleisher Gallery, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.A. (1993); Sum Daze, Hand-Colored Etchings by Gladys Nilsson, Dime Museum, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1993); Gladys Nilsson, Ovsey Gallery, Los Angeles, California, U.S.A. (1994); Gladys Nilsson, John Natsoulas Gallery, Davis, California, U.S.A. (1994); Gladys Nilsson, Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento, California, U.S.A. (1996); Gladys Nilsson, John Natsoulas Gallery, Davis, California, U.S.A. (1997); Gladys Nilsson, Watercolors, Fleisher/Ollman Gallery, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.A. (1997); Gladys Nilsson, John Natsoulas Gallery, Davis, California, U.S.A. (1998); Gladys Nilsson, A Print Survey, Printworks Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1998); Gladys Nilsson, Fleisher/Ollman Gallery, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.A. (2002); Gladys Nilsson, Adrian College, Adrian, Michigan, U.S.A. (2003); Gladys Nilsson, Jean Albano Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2003); Gladys Nilsson, Tory Folliard Gallery, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, U.S.A. (2004); Gladys Nilsson, Tory Folliard Gallery, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, U.S.A. (2004); Gladys Nilsson, 25 Years of Watercolors, Jean Albano Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2007); Gladys Nilsson, Luise Ross Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2008); Gladys Nilsson, Jean Albano Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2009); Gladys Nilsson, Works from 1966–2010, Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2010); Gladys Nilsson, Jean Albano Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2012); Gladys Nilsson, New Watercolors, Tory Folliard Gallery, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, U.S.A. (2013); Gladys Nilsson, Garth Greenan Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2014); Gladys Nilsson, The 1980s, Garth Greenan Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2017); Unencumbered, Hales London (2019); Gladys Nilsson: New Work, Rhona Hoffman Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2019); Gladys Nilsson: Honk! Fifty Years of Painting, Garth Greenan Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2020); Gladys Nilsson: Honk! Fifty Years of Painting, Matthew Marks Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2020); Gladys Nilsson: Out of this World, Madison Museum of Contemporary Art, Wisconsin, U.S.A. (2020-2021); Gladys Nilsson: Old Lady Drawings, 1990–2020, Parker Gallery, Los Angeles, California, U.S.A. (2020-2021); Gladys Nilsson: Games, Hales, London (2021); Gladys Nilsson: New Works in Watercolor, Garth Greenan Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2022); Gladys Nilsson, Hall Art Foundation, Reading, Vermont, U.S.A. (2025); Drawing, AIC Wall Project, The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2025); Wall Drawing Series: Gladys Nilsson, Menil Drawing Institute, Houston, Texas, U.S.A. (2025); and Gleefully Askew: A Gladys Nilsson Retrospective, Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento, California, U.S.A. (2026).
To this could be added the following extensive list of selected group exhibitions: The Hairy Who, Hyde Park Art Center, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1966); Hairy Who, Hyde Park Art Center, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1967); Now! Hairy Who Makes You Smell Good, Hyde Park Art Center, Chicago, Illinois U.S.A. (1968); Now! Hairy Who Makes You Smell Good, San Francisco Art Institute, San Francisco, California, U.S.A. (1968); The Hairy Who Drawing Show, School of Visual Arts, New York, New York, U.S.A. (1968); The Spirit of the Comics, Institute of Contemporary Art, University of Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania, U.S.A. (1969); Hairy Who, Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington D.C., U.S.A. (1969); Don Baum Says: “Chicago Needs Famous Artists,” Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1969); Chicago: Part II, Visual Arts Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (1969); Human Concern/Personal Torment: The Grotesque in American Art, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, New York, U.S.A. (1969-1970); Human Concern/Personal Torment: The Grotesque in American Art, Art Museum, University of California, Berkeley, California, U.S.A. (1969-1970); Wake Up Yer Scalp with Chicago, Richard Feigen Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (1970); Surplus Slop from the Windy City, San Francisco Art Institute, San Francisco, California, U.S.A. (1970); Phyllis Teens, Phyllis Kind Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1971); Boxed Top Art, Art Gallery, Illinois State University, Normal, Illinois, U.S.A. (1971); Museo de Arte Moderno, Bogotá (1973-1974); Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes, Santiago (1973-1974); Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes, Buenos Aires (1973-1974); Museo de Arte Moderno, Mexico City (1973-1974); Old and New Works by Artists from the Phyllis Kind Gallery, Foster Gallery, University of Wisconsin, Eau Claire, Wisconsin, U.S.A. (1976); Contemporary Images in Watercolor, Akron Art Institute, Akron, Ohio, U.S.A. (1976); Contemporary Figurative Painting in the Midwest, Madison Art Center, Madison, Wisconsin, U.S.A. (1977); Chicago Collects Chicago, Gallery 200, Visual Arts Building, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, Illinois, U.S.A. (1978); American Watercolorists, Mitchell Museum, Cedarhurst Center for the Arts, Mount Vernon, Illinois, U.S.A. (1979); Chicago Currents: The Koffler Foundation Collection, National Collection of Fine Arts, Smithsonian Institution, Washington D.C., U.S.A. (1979); 100 Artists, 100 Years: Alumni of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1980); Who Chicago? An Exhibition of Chicago Imagists, Camden Arts Centre, London (1980-1981); Who Chicago? An Exhibition of Chicago Imagists, Ceolfrith Gallery, Sunderland Arts Centre, Sunderland, United Kingdom (1980-1981); Who Chicago? An Exhibition of Chicago Imagists, Third Eye Centre, Glasgow, United Kingdom (1980-1981); Who Chicago? An Exhibition of Chicago Imagists, Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh, United Kingdom (1980-1981); Who Chicago? An Exhibition of Chicago Imagists, Ulster Museum, Belfast, United Kingdom (1980-1981); Contemporary Chicago Imagists, Art Gallery, Illinois Wesleyan University, Bloomington, Illinois, U.S.A. (1983); Ten Years of Collecting at the MCA, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1984); Drawing Acquisitions: 1981–1985, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, New York, U.S.A. (1985); Watercolor Alternatives: Four Chicago Artists: Gaines, Mejer, Nilsson, and Tenuta, South Bend Art Center, Indiana, U.S.A. (1990); Just Plane Screwy: Metaphysical and Metaphorical Tools by Artists, Wustum Museum of Fine Arts, Racine, Wisconsin, U.S.A. (1992); Parallel Visions: Modern Artists and Outsider Art, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, California, U.S.A. (1992-1993); Housewives: A Celebration of Domestic Engineering, Xochipilli Gallery, Birmingham, Michigan, U.S.A. (1995); Trends in Post-War Chicago Art, David and Alfred Smart Museum of Art, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1996-1997); Art in Chicago: 1945–1995, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1998); Gladys Nilsson and Jim Nutt, Butler Institute of American Art, Youngstown, Ohio, U.S.A. (1998); Nilsson and Nutt: Et Too Whootus, Kalamazoo Institute of Arts, Kalamazoo, Michigan, U.S.A. (1999); The Likeness of Being: Contemporary Self Portraits by Sixty Women, DC Moore Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2000); Chicago Loop: Imagist Art, 1949–1979, Whitney Museum of American Art at Champion, Stamford, Connecticut, U.S.A. (2000); Drawn Into the World: Drawings from the MCA Collection, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2006); Hairy Who? Ha!, Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2008); Chicago Imagism: 1965–1985, Russell Bowman Art Advisory, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2008); Modern and Contemporary Works on Paper, Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2009); Chicago Imagists at the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art, Madison Museum of Contemporary Art, Wisconsin, U.S.A. (2011-2012); Drawings, Russell Bowman Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2012); Someone Else’s Dream, Hyde Park Art Center, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2012); Gladys Nilsson and Julia Benjamin, National Exemplar Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2013); Hidden Treasures Unveiled: Watercolors, Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.A. (2014-2015); Head, Western Exhibitions, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2014-2015); Gesture Play, Simone Subal Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2016); Shout for Tomorrow, Hirschl & Adler Modern, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2016); Chicago and Vicinity, Shane Campbell Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2016); 125 from the Permanent Collection, Maier Museum of Art at Randolph College, Lynchburg, Virginia, U.S.A. (2016); Gesture Play, Simone Subal Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2016); Shout for Tomorrow, Hirschl & Adler Modern, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2016); Chicago and Vicinity, Shane Campbell Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2016); 125 from the Permanent Collection, Maier Museum of Art at Randolph College, Lynchburg, Virginia, U.S.A. (2016); Kings and Queens: Pinball, Imagists and Chicago, Elmhurst Art Museum, Elmhurst, Illinois, U.S.A. (2017); Investigating Identity: Race, Gender, and Sexuality in Contemporary Art, Maier Museum of Art at Randolph College, Lynchburg, Virginia, U.S.A. (2017); Famous Artists from Chicago, 1965–1975, Fondazione Prada, Milan, Italy (2017); Breaking the Mold: Investigating Gender, Speed Art Museum, Louisville, Kentucky, U.S.A. (2018); You Are Who I Think You Think You Are, American Medium, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2018); The Time Is Now! Art Worlds of Chicago’s South Side, 1960–1980, Smart Museum of Art, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2018-2019); 3-D Doing Things: The Imagist Object in Chicago Art, 1964–1930, Frances Young Tang Teaching Museum and Art Gallery, Skidmore College, Saratoga Springs, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2018-2019); Hairy Who? 1966–1969, Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2018-2019); Outliers and American Vanguard Art, National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C., U.S.A. (2018-2019); Outliers and American Vanguard Art, High Museum of Art, Atlanta, Georgia, U.S.A. (2018-2019); Outliers and American Vanguard Art, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, California, U.S.A. (2018-2019); West by Midwest: Geographies of Art and Kinship, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2018–2019); Chicago Imagists, Goldsmiths Centre for Contemporary Art, University of London, London (2019); Chicago Imagists, De La Warr Pavilion, Bexhill On Sea, East Sussex, United Kingdom (2019); Picture Gallery in Transformation, Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago at MASP, Museum of Art São Paulo Assis Chateaubriand, Brazil (2019); Beyond the Cape! Comics and Contemporary Art, Boca Raton Museum of Art, Boca Raton, Florida, U.S.A. (2019); Landscape Without Boundaries, Manetti Shrem Museum of Art, University of California Davis, Davis, California, U.S.A. (2019); Empowered, University of Northern Iowa Gallery of Art, Cedar Falls, Iowa, U.S.A. (2020); Drawing 2020, Gladstone Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2020); Parallel Phenomena, Andrew Edlin Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2021); Private Eye: The Imagist Impulse in Chicago Art, Newfields, Indianapolis Museum of Art, Indianapolis, Indiana, U.S.A. (2021); The Sublime in Nature, 24 Cork Street, London (2021); New Flavors: Collected at the Candy Store, Selections from the Manetti Shrem Museum, Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art, Davis, California, U.S.A. (2021); Ways of Seeing: Three Takes on the Jack Shear Drawing Collection, The Drawing Center, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2021-2022); The Candy Store: Funk, Nut, and Other Art With a Kick, Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento, California, U.S.A. (2022); “Pictures Girls Make,” Portraitures, BLUM, Los Angeles, California, U.S.A. (2023); Women on the Verge, Rhona Hoffman Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2023); Retinal Hysteria, Venus Over Manhattan, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2023–2024); Gladys Nilsson & Hend Samir, Parker Gallery, Los Angeles, California, U.S.A. (2024); She Laughs Back: Feminist Wit in 1970s Bay Area Art, University Library Gallery at Sacramento State, Sacramento, California, U.S.A. (2024); Are You Joking? Women & Humor, The Church, Sag Harbor, New York, U.S.A. (2024); Alive & Kicking: Fantastic Installations by Thomas Lanigan-Schmidt, Catalina Schliebener Muñoz, and Gladys Nilsson, Colby Museum of Art, Waterville, Maine, U.S.A. (2024); The Way I See It: Selections from the KAWS Collection, The Drawing Center, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2024–2025); Chicago Style, George Adams Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2024–2025); Bride of the Far Side, Post Times, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2025); Expanding the 50th: Shared Stories, Smart Museum of Art, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2025); The Body Imagined: Figurative Art in the Bank of America Collection, Mattatuck Museum, Waterbury, Connecticut, U.S.A. (2025); and Tending and Dreaming: Stories from the Collection, San Jose Museum of Art, San Jose, California, U.S.A. (2025).GLADYS NILSSON (United States of America, born 1940)
Born in Chicago, to Swedish immigrant parents, 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 New York. In 1990, she accepted a teaching position at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, where she is now a professor.
Nilsson grew up on the north side of Chicago and went to Lake View High School, while also attending extracurricular drawing classes. Nilsson later attended the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (1958-1962), where she met her future husband, fellow student Jim Nutt (born 1938). Nilsson and Nutt married in July 1961, and their son, Claude, was born the following year. Although Nilsson originally used oil paints, she switched to watercolours when pregnant in order to avoid the potential health hazards of turpentine.
In 1964, Jim Nutt and Gladys Nilsson began to teach children’s classes at the Hyde Park Art Center in Chicago. The pair (together with fellow artist James Falconer) approached the center’s exhibitions director, Don Baum, with the idea of a group show consisting of the three of them together with Art Green and Suellen Rocca. Baum agreed, and also suggested they include Karl Wirsum. The name of the group show, Hairy Who?, became the name of the group. It was coined by Karl Wirsum as a reference to WFMT art critic Harry Bouras. They exhibited at the Hyde Park Art Center in 1966, 1967, 1968, and 1969. The 1968 exhibition also travelled to the San Francisco Art Institute, San Francisco, California, and the last show, in 1969, travelled to the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, DC.
In 1969, Chicago gallery owner Phyllis Kind agreed to represent Nilsson and Nutt, giving both of them their first solo shows. The same year, the couple moved to Sacramento, California, where Nutt worked as an assistant professor of art atSacramento State College. In 1973, Nilsson became the first Hairy Who member to have a solo show at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York (a bittersweet experience since two of her paintings were stolen from the show). The following year, Nilsson and her family returned to Chicago, moving to Wilmette, Illinois (where they still remain today) in 1976.
Though she has mostly painted with watercolours on paper, Nilsson has also worked with collage. In her later work, Nilsson cut out imagery from fashion magazines in an exploration of ideals of feminine beauty.
In the spring of 2010, Nilsson was honoured with a large retrospective of her art at the Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art in Chicago.
Recently her work has also been featured in Gleefully Askew: A Gladys Nilsson Retrospective, at the Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento, California, U.S.A. (2026). The introduction to the exhibition (including 100 works covering her entire 60-year-plus career), set to travel in 2027 to the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art in Wisconsin, U.S.A. read as follows:
Born in Chicago in 1940, Gladys Nilsson is best known for her watercolors of long-limbed figures engaged in everyday micro-dramas. As a member of Chicago’s Hairy Who in the 1960s, Nilsson made watercolors that earned her a reputation as the most “feminine” member of the group—a characterization that she has challenged and spoofed throughout her career. Now in her 80s, Nilsson continues to actively work in her studio, creating surprising new works that revisit familiar themes with even greater aplomb, fluidity, and mischievousness. Nilsson’s long-overdue first museum retrospective will reunite her watercolors, paintings, drawings, collages, and prints from critical moments in her 60-year career, including her early Hairy Who years, her radical experiments while living in Sacramento between 1968 and 1976, and her irreverent and delightful recent works that explore ageing bodies.
Nilsson’s work is widely represented in various public collections like: Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A.; Brauer Museum of Art, Valparaiso University, Valparaiso, Indiana, U.S.A.; Kresge Art Museum, Michigan State University, Lansing, Michigan, U.S.A.; Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, California, U.S.A.; Madison Museum of Contemporary Art, Madison, Wisconsin, U.S.A.; Maier Museum of Art at Randolph College, Lynchburg, Virginia, U.S.A.; Mary and Leigh Block Museum of Art, Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois, U.S.A.; Midwest Museum of American Art, Elkhart, Indiana, U.S.A.; Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, U.S.A.; Morgan Library, New York, New York, U.S.A.; Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A.; Museum of Modern Art, New York, New York, U.S.A.; Museum Moderner Kunst, Vienna; New Orleans Museum of Art, New Orleans, Louisiana, U.S.A.; Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.A.; Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.A.; Phoenix Art Museum, Phoenix, Arizona, U.S.A.; Roger Brown Study Collection, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A.; Sheldon Museum of Art, University of Nebraska, Lincoln, Nebraska, U.S.A.; Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington D.C., U.S.A.; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, New York, U.S.A.; and Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, Connecticut, U.S.A.
Nilsson has shown her work in numerous solo exhibitions like Gladys Nilsson, Marjorie Dell Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1966); Gladys Nilsson, Clay Street Gallery, San Francisco Art Institute, San Francisco, California, U.S.A. (1969); Gladys Nilsson, Candy Store Gallery, Folsom, California, U.S.A. (1971); Gladys Nilsson, Art Gallery, Chico State College, Chico, California, U.S.A. (1971); Gladys Nilsson, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, New York, U.S.A. (1973); Gladys Nilsson, Portland Center for the Visual Arts, Portland, Oregon, U.S.A. (1979); Gladys Nilsson, Survey of Works on Paper, 1967–1979, Fine Arts Gallery, Wake Forest University, Winston-Salem, North Carolina, U.S.A. (1979-1980); Gladys Nilsson, Survey of Works on Paper, 1967–1979, Art Gallery, Corpus Christi State University, Corpus Christi, Texas, U.S.A. (1979-1980); Gladys Nilsson, Survey of Works on Paper, 1967–1979, Wustum Museum of Fine Arts, Racine, Wisconsin, U.S.A. (1979-1980); Gladys Nilsson, Phyllis Kind Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1983); Gladys Nilsson, Greatest Hits from Chicago, Selected Works 1967–1984, Randolph Street Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1984); Gladys Nilsson, Galerie Bonnier, Geneva, Switzerland (1985); Gladys Nilsson, Phyllis Kind Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1987); Gladys Nilsson, Phyllis Kind Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (1987); Gladys Nilsson, Phyllis Kind Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1991); Gladys Nilsson, Janet Fleisher Gallery, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.A. (1991); Gladys Nilsson, Ovsey Gallery, Los Angeles, California, U.S.A. (1992); Gladys Nilsson, Xochipilli Gallery, Birmingham, Michigan, U.S.A. (1992); Gladys Nilsson, Janet Fleisher Gallery, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.A. (1993); Sum Daze, Hand-Colored Etchings by Gladys Nilsson, Dime Museum, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1993); Gladys Nilsson, Ovsey Gallery, Los Angeles, California, U.S.A. (1994); Gladys Nilsson, John Natsoulas Gallery, Davis, California, U.S.A. (1994); Gladys Nilsson, Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento, California, U.S.A. (1996); Gladys Nilsson, John Natsoulas Gallery, Davis, California, U.S.A. (1997); Gladys Nilsson, Watercolors, Fleisher/Ollman Gallery, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.A. (1997); Gladys Nilsson, John Natsoulas Gallery, Davis, California, U.S.A. (1998); Gladys Nilsson, A Print Survey, Printworks Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1998); Gladys Nilsson, Fleisher/Ollman Gallery, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.A. (2002); Gladys Nilsson, Adrian College, Adrian, Michigan, U.S.A. (2003); Gladys Nilsson, Jean Albano Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2003); Gladys Nilsson, Tory Folliard Gallery, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, U.S.A. (2004); Gladys Nilsson, Tory Folliard Gallery, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, U.S.A. (2004); Gladys Nilsson, 25 Years of Watercolors, Jean Albano Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2007); Gladys Nilsson, Luise Ross Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2008); Gladys Nilsson, Jean Albano Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2009); Gladys Nilsson, Works from 1966–2010, Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2010); Gladys Nilsson, Jean Albano Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2012); Gladys Nilsson, New Watercolors, Tory Folliard Gallery, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, U.S.A. (2013); Gladys Nilsson, Garth Greenan Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2014); Gladys Nilsson, The 1980s, Garth Greenan Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2017); Unencumbered, Hales London (2019); Gladys Nilsson: New Work, Rhona Hoffman Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2019); Gladys Nilsson: Honk! Fifty Years of Painting, Garth Greenan Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2020); Gladys Nilsson: Honk! Fifty Years of Painting, Matthew Marks Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2020); Gladys Nilsson: Out of this World, Madison Museum of Contemporary Art, Wisconsin, U.S.A. (2020-2021); Gladys Nilsson: Old Lady Drawings, 1990–2020, Parker Gallery, Los Angeles, California, U.S.A. (2020-2021); Gladys Nilsson: Games, Hales, London (2021); Gladys Nilsson: New Works in Watercolor, Garth Greenan Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2022); Gladys Nilsson, Hall Art Foundation, Reading, Vermont, U.S.A. (2025); Drawing, AIC Wall Project, The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2025); Wall Drawing Series: Gladys Nilsson, Menil Drawing Institute, Houston, Texas, U.S.A. (2025); and Gleefully Askew: A Gladys Nilsson Retrospective, Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento, California, U.S.A. (2026).
To this could be added the following extensive list of selected group exhibitions: The Hairy Who, Hyde Park Art Center, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1966); Hairy Who, Hyde Park Art Center, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1967); Now! Hairy Who Makes You Smell Good, Hyde Park Art Center, Chicago, Illinois U.S.A. (1968); Now! Hairy Who Makes You Smell Good, San Francisco Art Institute, San Francisco, California, U.S.A. (1968); The Hairy Who Drawing Show, School of Visual Arts, New York, New York, U.S.A. (1968); The Spirit of the Comics, Institute of Contemporary Art, University of Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania, U.S.A. (1969); Hairy Who, Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington D.C., U.S.A. (1969); Don Baum Says: “Chicago Needs Famous Artists,” Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1969); Chicago: Part II, Visual Arts Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (1969); Human Concern/Personal Torment: The Grotesque in American Art, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, New York, U.S.A. (1969-1970); Human Concern/Personal Torment: The Grotesque in American Art, Art Museum, University of California, Berkeley, California, U.S.A. (1969-1970); Wake Up Yer Scalp with Chicago, Richard Feigen Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (1970); Surplus Slop from the Windy City, San Francisco Art Institute, San Francisco, California, U.S.A. (1970); Phyllis Teens, Phyllis Kind Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1971); Boxed Top Art, Art Gallery, Illinois State University, Normal, Illinois, U.S.A. (1971); Museo de Arte Moderno, Bogotá (1973-1974); Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes, Santiago (1973-1974); Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes, Buenos Aires (1973-1974); Museo de Arte Moderno, Mexico City (1973-1974); Old and New Works by Artists from the Phyllis Kind Gallery, Foster Gallery, University of Wisconsin, Eau Claire, Wisconsin, U.S.A. (1976); Contemporary Images in Watercolor, Akron Art Institute, Akron, Ohio, U.S.A. (1976); Contemporary Figurative Painting in the Midwest, Madison Art Center, Madison, Wisconsin, U.S.A. (1977); Chicago Collects Chicago, Gallery 200, Visual Arts Building, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, Illinois, U.S.A. (1978); American Watercolorists, Mitchell Museum, Cedarhurst Center for the Arts, Mount Vernon, Illinois, U.S.A. (1979); Chicago Currents: The Koffler Foundation Collection, National Collection of Fine Arts, Smithsonian Institution, Washington D.C., U.S.A. (1979); 100 Artists, 100 Years: Alumni of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1980); Who Chicago? An Exhibition of Chicago Imagists, Camden Arts Centre, London (1980-1981); Who Chicago? An Exhibition of Chicago Imagists, Ceolfrith Gallery, Sunderland Arts Centre, Sunderland, United Kingdom (1980-1981); Who Chicago? An Exhibition of Chicago Imagists, Third Eye Centre, Glasgow, United Kingdom (1980-1981); Who Chicago? An Exhibition of Chicago Imagists, Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh, United Kingdom (1980-1981); Who Chicago? An Exhibition of Chicago Imagists, Ulster Museum, Belfast, United Kingdom (1980-1981); Contemporary Chicago Imagists, Art Gallery, Illinois Wesleyan University, Bloomington, Illinois, U.S.A. (1983); Ten Years of Collecting at the MCA, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1984); Drawing Acquisitions: 1981–1985, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, New York, U.S.A. (1985); Watercolor Alternatives: Four Chicago Artists: Gaines, Mejer, Nilsson, and Tenuta, South Bend Art Center, Indiana, U.S.A. (1990); Just Plane Screwy: Metaphysical and Metaphorical Tools by Artists, Wustum Museum of Fine Arts, Racine, Wisconsin, U.S.A. (1992); Parallel Visions: Modern Artists and Outsider Art, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, California, U.S.A. (1992-1993); Housewives: A Celebration of Domestic Engineering, Xochipilli Gallery, Birmingham, Michigan, U.S.A. (1995); Trends in Post-War Chicago Art, David and Alfred Smart Museum of Art, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1996-1997); Art in Chicago: 1945–1995, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (1998); Gladys Nilsson and Jim Nutt, Butler Institute of American Art, Youngstown, Ohio, U.S.A. (1998); Nilsson and Nutt: Et Too Whootus, Kalamazoo Institute of Arts, Kalamazoo, Michigan, U.S.A. (1999); The Likeness of Being: Contemporary Self Portraits by Sixty Women, DC Moore Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2000); Chicago Loop: Imagist Art, 1949–1979, Whitney Museum of American Art at Champion, Stamford, Connecticut, U.S.A. (2000); Drawn Into the World: Drawings from the MCA Collection, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2006); Hairy Who? Ha!, Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2008); Chicago Imagism: 1965–1985, Russell Bowman Art Advisory, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2008); Modern and Contemporary Works on Paper, Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2009); Chicago Imagists at the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art, Madison Museum of Contemporary Art, Wisconsin, U.S.A. (2011-2012); Drawings, Russell Bowman Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2012); Someone Else’s Dream, Hyde Park Art Center, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2012); Gladys Nilsson and Julia Benjamin, National Exemplar Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2013); Hidden Treasures Unveiled: Watercolors, Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.A. (2014-2015); Head, Western Exhibitions, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2014-2015); Gesture Play, Simone Subal Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2016); Shout for Tomorrow, Hirschl & Adler Modern, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2016); Chicago and Vicinity, Shane Campbell Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2016); 125 from the Permanent Collection, Maier Museum of Art at Randolph College, Lynchburg, Virginia, U.S.A. (2016); Gesture Play, Simone Subal Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2016); Shout for Tomorrow, Hirschl & Adler Modern, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2016); Chicago and Vicinity, Shane Campbell Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2016); 125 from the Permanent Collection, Maier Museum of Art at Randolph College, Lynchburg, Virginia, U.S.A. (2016); Kings and Queens: Pinball, Imagists and Chicago, Elmhurst Art Museum, Elmhurst, Illinois, U.S.A. (2017); Investigating Identity: Race, Gender, and Sexuality in Contemporary Art, Maier Museum of Art at Randolph College, Lynchburg, Virginia, U.S.A. (2017); Famous Artists from Chicago, 1965–1975, Fondazione Prada, Milan, Italy (2017); Breaking the Mold: Investigating Gender, Speed Art Museum, Louisville, Kentucky, U.S.A. (2018); You Are Who I Think You Think You Are, American Medium, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2018); The Time Is Now! Art Worlds of Chicago’s South Side, 1960–1980, Smart Museum of Art, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2018-2019); 3-D Doing Things: The Imagist Object in Chicago Art, 1964–1930, Frances Young Tang Teaching Museum and Art Gallery, Skidmore College, Saratoga Springs, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2018-2019); Hairy Who? 1966–1969, Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2018-2019); Outliers and American Vanguard Art, National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C., U.S.A. (2018-2019); Outliers and American Vanguard Art, High Museum of Art, Atlanta, Georgia, U.S.A. (2018-2019); Outliers and American Vanguard Art, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, California, U.S.A. (2018-2019); West by Midwest: Geographies of Art and Kinship, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2018–2019); Chicago Imagists, Goldsmiths Centre for Contemporary Art, University of London, London (2019); Chicago Imagists, De La Warr Pavilion, Bexhill On Sea, East Sussex, United Kingdom (2019); Picture Gallery in Transformation, Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago at MASP, Museum of Art São Paulo Assis Chateaubriand, Brazil (2019); Beyond the Cape! Comics and Contemporary Art, Boca Raton Museum of Art, Boca Raton, Florida, U.S.A. (2019); Landscape Without Boundaries, Manetti Shrem Museum of Art, University of California Davis, Davis, California, U.S.A. (2019); Empowered, University of Northern Iowa Gallery of Art, Cedar Falls, Iowa, U.S.A. (2020); Drawing 2020, Gladstone Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2020); Parallel Phenomena, Andrew Edlin Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2021); Private Eye: The Imagist Impulse in Chicago Art, Newfields, Indianapolis Museum of Art, Indianapolis, Indiana, U.S.A. (2021); The Sublime in Nature, 24 Cork Street, London (2021); New Flavors: Collected at the Candy Store, Selections from the Manetti Shrem Museum, Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art, Davis, California, U.S.A. (2021); Ways of Seeing: Three Takes on the Jack Shear Drawing Collection, The Drawing Center, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2021-2022); The Candy Store: Funk, Nut, and Other Art With a Kick, Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento, California, U.S.A. (2022); “Pictures Girls Make,” Portraitures, BLUM, Los Angeles, California, U.S.A. (2023); Women on the Verge, Rhona Hoffman Gallery, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2023); Retinal Hysteria, Venus Over Manhattan, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2023–2024); Gladys Nilsson & Hend Samir, Parker Gallery, Los Angeles, California, U.S.A. (2024); She Laughs Back: Feminist Wit in 1970s Bay Area Art, University Library Gallery at Sacramento State, Sacramento, California, U.S.A. (2024); Are You Joking? Women & Humor, The Church, Sag Harbor, New York, U.S.A. (2024); Alive & Kicking: Fantastic Installations by Thomas Lanigan-Schmidt, Catalina Schliebener Muñoz, and Gladys Nilsson, Colby Museum of Art, Waterville, Maine, U.S.A. (2024); The Way I See It: Selections from the KAWS Collection, The Drawing Center, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2024–2025); Chicago Style, George Adams Gallery, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2024–2025); Bride of the Far Side, Post Times, New York, New York, U.S.A. (2025); Expanding the 50th: Shared Stories, Smart Museum of Art, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A. (2025); The Body Imagined: Figurative Art in the Bank of America Collection, Mattatuck Museum, Waterbury, Connecticut, U.S.A. (2025); and Tending and Dreaming: Stories from the Collection, San Jose Museum of Art, San Jose, California, U.S.A. (2025).
