Tony DeLap is Orange County’s foremost living artist. He has been at the nexus of significant art movements throughout his career. A leading practitioner of Southern California minimalism and “finish/fetish,” he also played a part in the development of op art, hard-edge painting, the California Light and Space movement, and site-specific installation. For years he has played with the concept of an artwork’s edge and explored the point where painting and sculpture intersect. His expertise and interest in magic have led him to make objects “float” and otherwise defy explanation. He was the first art professor to be hired at the University of California, Irvine, and taught there for thirty years, influencing generations of young artists.

Laguna Art Museum’s 2018 retrospective of DeLap’s work will include approximately eighty paintings, sculptures, and drawings, and the accompanying catalogue will survey DeLap’s career and influence, from his first exhibition at the Oakland Museum of California in 1960 to the present, taking a critical look at his role in various movements as well as the decidedly non-linear development of his body of work.