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Kaum jemand kommt zu ihrer Beerdigung. Die Nachbarn, denen sie verhasst war, jagen ihre Kinder aus dem Haus, die Wandgemälde, mit denen Mgudlandlu ihren Wohnraum dekoriert hatte, werden übertüncht. Wenige Jahre später ist sie beinahe vollständig vergessen.
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Gladys Mgudlandlu's painted dreams went down well. In 1962, she was one of the first black women artists in apartheid South Africa to have a solo exhibition at a gallery, the Rodin Gallery in Cape Town. The husband of the gallery owner Jean Ra'hel Fuchs discovered Mgudlandlu's art during a business trip thanks to the recommendation of a customer, and literally swept works by the artist out from under the bed and behind the oven. After her first show, she became a sort of media personality in South Africa. Newspapers reported on her paintings and exhibitions; ministers' wives had themselves photographed with her. More than 2,000 people attended her first opening. The gallery was literally overflowing; crowds of people gathered on the streets. Fifty-eight of the 76 works exhibited were sold. Mgudlandlu, who was a very eloquent speaker, gave countless interviews, including with television. She was in the public eye for ten years. But in 1971, she was injured so severely in a car accident that she had to give up painting. In 1979, she died alone and impoverished in her house with the number 120 in which she had worked and lived for decades. Hardly anyone went to her funeral. The neighbors, who hated her, drove her children out of the house; the murals with which Mgudlandlu had decorated her living area were painted over. A few years later, she was almost completely forgotten.
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