This exhibition will be the first American retrospective of Donald Judd's work in thirty years. Due to the unprecedented archival access granted by the Judd Foundation to MoMA's curatorial team, this show presents a unique opportunity to assess Judd's career anew.

Most writings to date have dwelled on Judd's place within Minimalism and drawn heavily on biography as well as the artist's own statements on his work. With an aim to counter the mythologizing and interpretation-heavy literature that still prevails in Judd scholarship, this book will marshal in-depth research in order to expand readers' knowledge of the revolutionary nature of his working method. The essays included will delve into the specifics of Judd's industrial materials, fabrication processes, exhibition histories, and activities related to design and architecture.

"Abstract Resistance" considers the metaphor of resistance as a political and compositional force defining the art of the past half-century. Starting with Michel Foucault's assertion that "where there is power, there is resistance," it explores art made since World War II that has been shaped by traumatic historical events in complex ways. Rather than creating an explicit art of social protest, artists have responded to violence and upheaval with art that rejects the comfort of moral certainty. Such art withholds information and evades identification. Exhibition curator Yasmil Raymond provides an overview of the exhibition's themes and artworks; art historian Simon Baier traces the origins and development of nonobjective art through the writings of critics such as Charles Baudelaire and Meyer Schapiro; and philosopher Marcus Steinweg draws on the ideas of Theodor Adorno and others to provide a theoretical framework for artistic resistance.