Eric Malthouse

National Museum of Wales, the National Library of Wales, Aberystwyth University, Art UK and the Government Art Collection

watercolours of scenes around Barry which he continued until he died in 1997.^[1]

St. Ives Fishermen', paintings, the St. Ives 'Rock Pools' which were the foundation of his work as a non-figurative painter and showed the influence of Ceri Richards and Patrick Heron.^[1] By now his work was concerned with a close analysis of colour and spatial composition^[1][5] and by 1959 his paintings had become completely non-figurative.^[1] He painted murals for University Hall, Penylan, Cardiff and for the Wales Gas Board.^[1] Malthouse had been involved in printmaking since his school days at King Edward V1 School Aston where his art master showed him how to make a burin from an umbrella strut with which he made his first linocut.^[9] Printmaking became an increasingly important component of his future work.^[1][9] In 1968 Eric Malthouse and several other artists were commissioned by the Welsh Arts Council to design posters to be displayed on billboards throughout Wales.^[3] Malthouse's poster "Midsummer" (10 x 20 ft) was the first to be displayed outside Wales in Oxford.^[10] Of the six posters produced only those by Eric Malthouse, Jeffrey Steele and Allen Jones were said to have asserted themselves, with the Malthouse print being described as a "sensuous, map-like spread of large sinuous areas of warm dark colours" which enlivened the street in Cardiff where it was posted^[11] He produced illustrations for two books, Prynu Dol^[12] a collection of short stories by Kate Roberts and Ancestor Worship^[13] the first published collection of poems by Emyr Humphreys