Ernest Charles Wallcousins (

né The birth name is the name of the person given upon their birth. The term may be applied to the surname, the given name or to the entire name. Where births are required to be officially registered, the entire name entered onto a births registe ...

Cousins, 21 July 1882"England and Wales Death Registration Index 1837-2007," database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:QVC5-K4RW : 4 September 2014), Charles Ernest Wall-Cousins, 1976; from "England & Wales Deaths, 1837-2006," database, findmypast (http://www.findmypast.com : 2012); citing Death, Southend On Sea, Essex, England, General Register Office, Southport, England. – 1976) was a British

illustrator An illustrator is an artist who specializes in enhancing writing or elucidating concepts by providing a visual representation that corresponds to the content of the associated text or idea. The illustration may be intended to clarify complicate ...

and later a famous portraitist and landscape painter. He illustrated royal occasions, was an official WWII artist, and painted British prime minister

Winston Churchill Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 1874 – 24 January 1965) was a British statesman, military officer, and writer who was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1940 to 1945 (Winston Churchill in the Second World War, ...

's WWII victory portrait in 1945.

Work

Wallcousins illustrated ''Celtic Myth, Legend, Poetry, and Romance'', by Charles Squire (Gresham, 1905, 1920); and '' Myths of Babylonia and Assyria'', by Donald A. Mackenzie (Gresham, 1915). His style was

Pre-Raphaelite The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood (PRB), later known as the Pre-Raphaelites, was a group of English painters, poets, and art critics, founded in 1848 by William Holman Hunt, John Everett Millais, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, William Michael Rossetti, ...

, Celtic romance but with strong, muscular fighting heroes as well as romantic women. His work shows dramatic structure, anatomic accuracy and sensuality, with a characteristic vault of space at the top of the design. His works include illustrations for '' Bibby's Annual'', 1921, including its front cover. He designed posters for the London Underground Group 1925, and became famed for illustrations of royal occasions. Papers in

The National Archives National archives are the archives of a country. The concept evolved in various nations at the dawn of modernity based on the impact of nationalism upon bureaucratic processes of paperwork retention. Conceptual development From the Middle Ages i ...

show that he was the designer of the famous Keep Calm and Carry On poster. Wallcousins painted a famous portrait of Sir Winston Churchill from life, as the wartime Prime Minister celebrating the Allied victories in 1945. This was commissioned by Odhams Press for the “Victory Book” published in 1946. He also painted Sir

Henry Wood Sir Henry Joseph Wood (3 March 186919 August 1944) was an English conductor best known for his association with London's annual series of promenade concerts, known as the Proms. He conducted them for nearly half a century, introducing hundr ...

, the conductor of

The Proms The BBC Proms is an eight-week summer season of daily orchestral classical music concerts and other events held annually, predominantly in the Royal Albert Hall in central London. Robert Newman founded The Proms in 1895. Since 1927, the ...

for over 50 years. Wallcousins's works can be found in museums including the

Science Museum, London The Science Museum is a major museum on Exhibition Road in South Kensington, London. It was founded in 1857 and is one of the city's major tourist attractions, attracting 3.3 million visitors annually in 2019. Like other publicly funded ...

; and the Museum and Art Gallery,

Southend-on-Sea Southend-on-Sea (), commonly referred to as Southend (), is a coastal city and unitary authorities of England, unitary authority area with Borough status in the United Kingdom, borough status in south-eastern Essex, England. It lies on the nor ...

References

External links

National Portrait Gallery
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Wallcousins, Ernest Charles 1882 births 1976 deaths British illustrators