Phyllis Bramson: Under the Pleasure Dome

Phyllis Bramson is an enigmatic and influential artist and professor in the Chicago art world. Her lush colors, coy figuration and wholehearted embrace of the decorative in the service of masterfully composed assemblages and paintings that draw the viewer ever further in to many layered stories are continuous threads in her decades long practice of artmaking and teaching. 

Bramson’s use of kitsch objects, erotic overtones and Orientalist references creates lightly veiled, deeply complex works. The Chicago Cultural Center’s exhibition “Under the Pleasure Dome” is a wide selection of paintings and assemblages drawn from the artist’s collection and illustrative of her work over many years including examples of her most recent “scroll” series.

Credit: Exhibition overview from museum website.