CHICAGO, IL.- The Carrie Secrist Gallery presents, Then is Now, a dual exhibition featuring works by Phyllis Bramson and Judith Geichman. The exhibit will open on March 20th and run through April 24th.

Both Bramson and Geichman are interested in unconventional beauty and a certain kind of visual clarity in their work. Additionally, they share several common sources including including Chinoiserie, Toile de Jou, Chinese scholar rocks, Rococo, abstraction, and elements of collage.

Yet for all their similarities these two artist have, the substance of their work differs significantly. Despite outright figuration in her paintings, Bramson claims to "plot narrative moves which involve abstraction as the backbone." Geichman's work, on the other hand, is outwardly about abstraction and modernism, though when she creates it, she is thinking of figuration.

Some of the pivotal aspects of Bramson's art include eroticism, Orientalism, and a form or random "touring". Though she asserts that modernism is very important to her, she calls herself a Surface Surrealist, noting the undeniable influence of the Chicago tradition of figure painting, particularly Darger and Seymour Rosofsky. Geichman, on the other hand, relates to Helen Frankenthaler, Jackson Pollock and the New York school of painting. She sees herself as carrying on that tradition, but adds her own twist through her engagement with figuration as one aspect towards abstraction.

Phyllis Bramsons work is in the permanent collections of The New Museum of Contemporary Art, NYC, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, The Art Institute of Chicago, National Museum of American Art, Washington D.C. as well as many other major museums throughout the world. Among other notable accomplishments, she is a three time recipient of a NEA Fellowship, a Guggenheim Fellowship, Anonymous Was a Woman Reward, and a Tiffany Award.

Currently, Judith Geichman is teaching at the School of the Art Institute Chicago and has had solo exhibitions at The Chicago Cultural Center and The Illinois State Museum. Geichman has also been in group exhibitions at The Rockford Art Museum and the National Academy of Art, New York. Other accomplishments include two National Endowment for the Arts Awards, a Margaret Klimek Phillips Fellowship and a Gil Society Artist Fellowship Residency to Akureyri, Iceland in 2005.