Steamboat with Two Sailors, Lighthouse and Rocks - Alfred Wallis

A characteristic maritime scene by Cornish artist Alfred Wallis, featuring a steamship navigating rough waters near a lighthouse, rendered in his signature naïve style.

Alfred Wallis, a former Cornish fisherman and scrap merchant, began painting in his late sixties following the death of his wife. Working primarily on salvaged cardboard and scraps of paper, he utilised household paints to record his memories of the sea. This work, Steamboat with Two Sailors, Lighthouse and Rocks, displays the characteristic lack of formal perspective that defines his output. Wallis prioritised the relative importance of objects over their physical distance from the viewer, a technique often described as mapping rather than traditional representation.

The composition is dominated by the dark hull of the steamship, which cuts through the grey, turbulent water. Wallis often used the natural colour of the cardboard as a base, allowing the raw material to function as the sky or the horizon. The lighthouse, positioned to the left, acts as a vertical anchor against the diagonal movement of the vessel. His application of paint is direct and unrefined, reflecting his lack of formal training and his reliance on materials readily available in his home in St Ives.

Wallis was discovered by Ben Nicholson and Christopher Wood in 1928, who were drawn to the raw honesty of his work. His approach to space and form influenced the development of the St Ives School of artists. By ignoring the conventions of academic painting, Wallis captured the essence of maritime life through a personal, simplified visual language. His works remain significant for their rejection of artifice, focusing instead on the immediate experience of the sea and the vessels that navigated it. This print captures the texture of the original cardboard support, preserving the tactile quality of his unique method.