Life in Colour & Form: Robert and Barbro Nilsson

On the island of Lidingö, a twenty-minute journey from central Stockholm, a sculptor’s former home has become one of Sweden’s most distinctive art destinations. Carl Milles, one of Sweden’s most celebrated sculptors, and his wife, the artist Olga Milles, bought the property in 1907 and built their home and studios there. In 1936 the family donated Millesgården to the Swedish people. Today it combines a sculpture park, the artists’ home, an antiquities collection, an art gallery, a restaurant and a museum shop, and it is open year-round. The Nilssons’ work is shown in the gallery, in a place that was itself shaped by a creative partnership.

That resonance is deliberate. Museum Director Sara Källström says the exhibition continues Millesgården’s interest in significant artistic and design partnerships. “In the work of Robert and Barbro Nilsson, as in that of Carl and Olga Milles,” she notes, “the boundaries between art, craft, and everyday life dissolve. Their home and working environment become part of the artwork itself – a place where ideas, materials, and creative processes constantly coexist.”

The Nilssons’ own connections to the site run deep. Robert Nilsson (1894–1980), born in Höganäs, studied under Carl Milles at the Royal Swedish Academy of Fine Arts. He gained international recognition at the 1937 Paris World’s Fair and later collaborated closely with architect Sigurd Lewerentz on major projects, including St. Mark’s Church in Stockholm and St. Peter’s Church in Klippan. His curiosity moved him freely between sculpture, ceramics, design and architecture.

Barbro Nilsson (1899–1983) grew up on Lidingö, the daughter of landscape architect Emma Lundberg. She became one of Sweden’s most important textile artists, and as Artistic Director of AB Märta Måås-Fjetterström’s weaving studio in Båstad she set a new standard for Swedish textile design. Her work joined traditional weaving techniques to a modern, vibrant expression. As head teacher in textiles at Konstfack, she also influenced generations of artists in Sweden and abroad.

For more than forty years the couple’s creative world was documented in sketches, weaving samples, watercolours, models, photographs, letters and diaries, and much of it has been preserved. Scholarships allowed the Nilssons to spend several years in Rome, an experience that impacted them throughout their career. Back in Sweden, they commissioned architect Sven Ivar Lind to design a home and studio outside Höganäs, where they lived and worked.

Life in Colour and Form brings together textiles, sculpture and painting with sketches, models and archival material. Monumental textiles, designs and weaving samples fill the gallery from floor to ceiling. Alongside them stands what may be Sweden’s largest loom, a specially built piece seven meters long.

The show builds on a widely praised presentation at the Blå Hallen art and cultural centre in Höganäs in 2024. Blå Hallen serves as guest curator, adapting its original concept for Millesgården’s gallery, and most of the works are on loan from the couple’s grandchildren.

The exhibition shows how two artistic practices, defined by uncompromising quality and creative joy, developed side by side, and it suggests a life lived entirely in colour and form.

Life in Colour and Form: Robert and Barbro Nilsson
12 September 2026 – 29 March 2027

Millesgården Museum

@millesgarden