Milton Resnick
1917–2004
Introduction
Milton Resnick (January 7, 1917 – March 12, 2004) was an American artist noted for abstract paintings that coupled scale with density of incident. It was not uncommon for some of the largest paintings to weigh in excess of three hundred pounds, almost all of it pigment. He had a long and varied career, lasting about sixty-five years. He produced at least eight hundred canvases and eight thousand works on paper and board.
Both he and his wife Pat Passlof were active in the arts community as well as the poetry sphere. Resnick's poetry was later exhibited as a part of The Milton Resnick and Pat Passlof Foundation show "U+ME: Paintings and Poetry by Milton Resnick and Matthew Wong" (2023), which presented poems and paintings by Resnick and Wong to reflect the artists' visual and written dialogue.
Paintings held in public collections include: New Bride (1963), Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, D.C.; Mound (1961), National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; Saturn (1976), National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, Ontario; Elephant (1977), Milton Resnick and Pat Passlof Foundation, New York; Earth (1976), Museum of Modern Art, NYC; Wedding (1962), The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Pink Fire (1971), National Gallery of Australia, Canberra; and Untitled (1982), Whitney Museum of American Art, New York. Many pictures of comparable quality are held in smaller public and private collections.
His remaining estate is held in trust by the Milton Resnick and Pat Passlof Foundation. In 2018, one year after the centenary of his birth, the Foundation opened his former residence and studio at 87 Eldridge Street in Manhattan as The Milton Resnick and Pat Passlof Foundation, a nonprofit public exhibition space showcasing his work alongside that of his wife Pat Passlof, other Abstract Expressionist painters, and contemporary abstractionists.
A biography of Milton Resnick (written by student/friend, painter, and critic Geoffrey Dorfman, who is also the author of the 2002 Resnick monograph Out of the Picture) — Milton Resnick: Painter in the Age of Painting — is forthcoming in September 2026.
Information from Wikipedia, made available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License. Accessed August 8, 2026.
Introduction
One of the last survivors of the original generation of Abstract Expressionist painters. Born in Russia, but active in the Lower East Side of Manhattan for most of his career.
Country of birth
Ukraine
Roles
Artist, painter, teacher
ULAN identifier
500007270
Names
Milton Resnick
Information from the Getty Research Institute's Union List of Artist Names ® (ULAN), made available under the ODC Attribution License. Accessed July 9, 2026.
