Antoni Tàpies started art during a long convalescence whilst recovering from a lung disease.

He gradually devoted more time to drawing and painting and finally gave up his law studies to dedicate himself to art. Co-founder of the ‘Dau al Set’ in 1948, he began to exhibit at the Salones de Octubre (Barcelona) as well as the Salon del Once in Madrid.

After his first individual exhibition at the Galerías Layetanas (Barcelona), he travelled to Paris in 1950 on a scholarship from the French government. In these initial years he began to participate at the Venice Biennale and exhibited again at the Galerías Layetanas. He also exhibited in the USA in Chicago and an individual exhibition at the Martha Jackson Gallery in New York in 1953.

Since that time, his exhibitions would take place worldwide both collectively and individually in leading galleries and museums such as Guggenheim (New York) and the Museum of Modern Art (París).

He has been awarded prizes including:

• A. Real el Príncipe of Asturias arts award
• Japanese Art Association Imperial award
• National Culture award
• Grand Prix in French Art award 
There have also been dedicated anthologies of Tàpies’ work in Tokyo (1976), New York (1977 and 2005), Rome (1980), Amsterdam (1980), Madrid (1980), Venice (1982), Milan (1985), Vienna (1986) and Brussels (1986). 
He was an informal artist who created work with non-artistic materials but which were still very symbolic. Over the years he would work with suggestive imagery including cruciform shapes, the “X” and the number “8” symbols of infinity. 
He is represented in key museums around the world including the foundation named after him in Barcelona, The Queen Sofía Art Museum (Madrid), Guggenheim Museums of Berlín, Bilbao and New York, Fukoka Art Museum (Japan), MOMA New York and Tate Gallery London.