We study the pion distribution amplitude (π DA) in the context of a nonlocal chiral quark model. The corresponding Lagrangian reproduces the phenomenological values of the pion mass and decay constant, as well as the momentum dependence of the quark propagator obtained in lattice calculations. It is found that the obtained π DA has two symmetric maxima, which arise from the new contributions generated by the nonlocal character of the interactions. This π DA is applied to leading order and next-to-leading order calculations of the pion-photon transition form factor. Implications of the results are discussed.