Known for his precisionist, Pop-inflected paintings that often incorporate text, as well as for a series of tightly focused photo books centered on the environs of Los Angeles, California-based painter Ed Ruscha has achieved an international reputation. A high point in his career came in 2005, when he was the U.S. representative at the Venice Biennale. His exhibition there was enthusiastically received by the public and the press.

A show at the Corcoran features hometown painter Chris Martin, whose paintings defy all manner of spatial, material and formal conventions.

For more than 50 years, the Los Angeles painter and musician Llyn Foulkes has decried both art world careerism and trends in popular music. At 76, he remains a dissenting voice. Often left out of histories of art, he refers to himself, bittersweetly, as the “Zelig” of contemporary art, referring to the Woody Allen character, a pervasive and influential figure ultimately uncredited for the role he played in 20th-century history.

The quirky and passionate Abstract Expressionist Milton Resnick had a profound effect on the author during his formative years as a painter.

Upon his sudden death at age 33, Blinky Palermo left behind an extensive group of abstract works that has had a lasting impact on new generations of painters. A current U.S. museum survey examines his brief but influential career.