Anders Nilsen

Anders Nilsen (born 1973) is an American cartoonist who lives in Los Angeles, California.

Biography Nilsen graduated with an art degree from the University of New Mexico in 1996. He moved to Chicago in 1999 to get a Master of Fine Arts in painting, and Mome. His graphic novel Dogs and Water won an Ignatz Award in 2005. An excerpt from Dogs and Water was featured in the inaugural 2006 edition of the Best American Comics anthology, and the book was expanded and reissued in hardcover in 2007. In 2007, Nilsen won an Ignatz Award for his graphic memoir, Don't Go Where I Can't Follow, in 2012, he won an Ignatz Award for Big Questions, a collected edition of his comic book series and two more Ignatz Awards in 2025 for Outstanding Artist and Outstanding Comic for Tongues Supplement #1 .

Nilsen is co-founder of Autoptic, a bi-annual festival of independent comics and art culture that takes place in Minneapolis. He is also one of the organizers of comics residency Pierre Feuille Ciseaux at the Angoulême International Comics Festival. Nilsen has been regularly holding lectures and workshops at various organizations, including Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok, Forecast program in Berlin, Center for the Humanities at the University of Wisconsin, Center for Cartoon Studies, and Stanford University.

Awards 2001: Xeric Award for The Ballad of the Two-Headed Boy 2005: Ignatz Award for Dogs and Water 2007: Ignatz Award for Don't Go Where I Can't Follow 2012: Ignatz Award for Big Questions 2012: Lynd Ward Graphic Novel Prize for Big Questions 2025: Ignatz Award (2) for Tongues Supplement #1 2026: Guggenheim Fellowship in Fiction.

Selected works Dogs and Water, Drawn & Quarterly, October 2004, Monologues for the Coming Plague, Fantagraphics, 2006, Don’t Go Where I Can’t Follow, Drawn & Quarterly, 2006 (reissued 2012), The End, Fantagraphics, Coconino Press, January 2007, Monologues for Calculating the Destiny of Black Holes, Fantagraphics, January 2009, Big Questions, Drawn & Quarterly, June 2011, Rage of Poseidon, Drawn & Quarterly, October 2013, God and the Devil at War in the Garden, May 2015, Self Published Poetry is Useless, Drawn & Quarterly, September 2015, A Walk in Eden, Drawn & Quarterly, October 2016, In Your Next Life You Will Be Together With All of Your Friends, No Miracles Press, March 2021, Tongues, Volume 1, Pantheon, March 2025, Every Day Is Today, No Miracles Press, January 2026,