Wallis was a sailor, trader in bits and pieces and odd job man who took up painting 'for company' after his wife died. Although he was untrained, his pictures (made using house and boat paint on old pieces of cardboard and wood) inspired members of the St Ives school of artists, such as Ben Nicholson and Kit Wood with their simplicity and directness. He died in poverty in Penzance, but his grave was tiled handsomely by the well-known studio potter Bernard Leach.
