Bernard Gilardi was born in Wisconsin Rapids in 1920 and died in 2008.  Gilardi created about 400 paintings  in the basement of his Milwaukee home over a 45 year period. He did not sell or exhibit his work. Despite having little formal art education, Gilardi had always intended to be an artist. He worked full time for a lithography company while supporting his family but also worked consistently on his art. His work was first shown publicly in 2010 at The Portrait Society Gallery.  In 2012 Gilardi was the subject of a retrospective at the Museum of Wisconsin Art. Lawrence University also presented a solo exhibition of his religious paintings in 2012 and his work is now in major museum collections, including the Chazen Museum of Art in Madison, Wisconsin; the Milwaukee Art Museum and the Museum of Wisconsin Art.

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In March of 2019, Bernard Gilardi had his first one-person exhibition titled We Belong in NY at Shrine Gallery presented by Maurizio Cattelan. This show was reviewed in New York Times, Artsy and Hyperallergic. "In Gilardi’s paintings, we see a feverish, unleashed imagination at play,"according to Artsy. Gilardi may be one of Wisconsin's most important (and certainly most quizzical) historic artists. PSG celebrated this momentous accomplishment with a select exhibition of his gender themed work in the PSG Project Space, titled Bernard Gilardi: Gender Dynamic.