Geoffrey Dorfman is a painter and writer on cultural history, in particular — but not limited to — Modernism and Modern Art. He is a trustee of the Milton Resnick and Pat Passlof Foundation and was recently interviewed by the New York Times.
He received his BFA from Cooper Union (’71) and his MFA from Syracuse University (’73). An Adjunct Associate Professor at the College of Staten Island/CUNY, he has taught painting, drawing and modern culture there since 1978. He has also taught a postgraduate course on Delacroix’s Journals at the Parsons School of Design, and served as visiting Assistant Professor of Art at Dartmouth College in 2000/01.
He was represented by Oscarsson-Hood in the 1980’s. His exhibition of monotypes in 2003 at the Painting Center was reviewed as, “a gem of a show.” He has authored several articles on painting for Artforum, (one receiving the cover) and on music for Stagebill magazine. His book, Out of the Picture; Milton Resnick and the New York School, Midmarch Arts Press, 2003, received rave reviews in the College Art Association Art Journal, The Provincetown Arts Annual of 2005, and >artcritical.com<. It was begun in 1978 with an NEA Individual Fellowship Grant.
An exhibition of his own work at the Painting Center in New York City in October of 2005 received stellar reviews. The Brooklyn Rail praised his commitment to, “ the notion of the classic brush stroke, the sensual rebound and multitude of responses possible...”
He also curated the “Hans Hofmann: The Legacy,” show at the Painting Center in New York City. That exhibition received excellent reviews in the N.Y. Times, The N.Y. Sun, and The N.Y. Observer. In 2006 he won the Henry Ward Ranger Prize from the National Academy of Design, and the following year contributed an essay to the book, Abstract Expressionism and Other Modern Works: The Muriel Kallis Newman Collection at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, co-published by the Metropolitan Museum of Art and Yale University Press. He has shown solo at the Ober Gallery in Kent, Ct. in October of 2007, November, 2012, and August, 2014. He received a retrospective exhibition at Rider University in February of 2013 to critical acclaim.
Other than his own painting, he produced a film, Milton Resnick Paints a Picture, and just completed a full length biography of that artist which remains a manuscript seeking publication.
He has more recently curated four Milton Resnick exhibitions at the following venues: Mana Contemporary in Jersey City 2014, Mana Contemporary Chicago 2014, Cheim and Read New York 2018 (catalog essay,) and the Milton Resnick and Pat Passlof Foundation in New York 2018/19, as well as Pat Passlof 'Works on Paper' at the Studio School in New York 2020, and ‘The One and the Many;’ a group show at the MRPPF in 2021 (catalog essay.)