Alfred Wallis 阿爾弗雷德．沃利斯

Wallis was born in Devon in 1855. In the 1870s he had been a ʻmariner, merchant serviceʼ crossing the Atlantic and later working in the smaller fishing boats closer to shore before becoming a scrap-metal merchant in St Ives.

In 1922, and with no art training, Wallis took up painting ʻfor companyʼ after the death of his wife. Wallis had little money and mainly painted on found bits of card and discarded packaging. Using household and ship paint from the supply stores in St Ives, Wallis painted ships and boats, seascapes and the villages of Cornwall in a limited supply of colours. Wallis painted 6 days a week, producing hundreds of works. Wallis was approached by Ben Nicholson and Christopher Wood in 1928 when the two London artists were visiting St Ives. They championed his work back in London and included him in the Seven & Five Societyʼs exhibition in 1929. Towards the end of his life, Wallis became increasingly isolated. He died in Madron Poorhouse in 1942.