© Michael Abramson, Courtesy of Blue Sky Gallery.
Between 1975 and ’77, Michael Abramson (1948-2011) created an extraordinary body of work documenting Chicago’s Southside nightclubs as the subject of his Masters thesis for the Illinois Institute of Technology. Abramson made the rounds, carrying a camera and strobe light to catch all the action going down at Perv’s House, Pepper’s Hideout, The High Chaparral, The Patio Lounge, and The Showcase Lounge.
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The sound was afterhours, featuring the funky, soulful vibes of blues artists like Little Mac Simmons, Bobby Rush, Lady Margo, and Little Ed. But Abramson wasn’t checking for the musicians on stage — he came for the crowd on the dancefloors and the bars, shooting half a dozen rolls every night inside this rarely seen milieu. “It was a living self-contained theater,” Abramson said of those heady nights.
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Now a selection of the works will be on view in Michael Abramson: Light on the Southside at Blue Sky Gallery in Portland, OR (August 2 – September 2, 2018), bringing the scene back to life. It is, in the words of British novelist Nick Hornby, an admirer of Abramson’s work, “One tiny corner of the world over a handful of evenings a long time ago; but that tiny corner of the world has, for decades now, meant a great deal to an awful lot of people scattered all over the world.”
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© Michael Abramson, Courtesy of Blue Sky Gallery.
© Michael Abramson, Courtesy of Blue Sky Gallery.