Henry Wallis (1830 - 1916) was an English Pre-Raphaelite painter, writer and collector.

Wallis is best remembered for his first great success, the painting titled Death of Chatterton, which he exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1856. The painting depicted the impoverished late 18th-century poet Thomas Chatterton, who poisoned himself in despair at the age of seventeen, and was considered a romantic hero for many young and struggling artists in Wallis's day. His method and style in Chatterton reveal the importance of his connection to the Pre-Raphaelite movement, seen in the vibrant colours and careful build-up of symbolic detail.

Selected bibliography

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• van de Put, A. Henry Wallis, 1830–1916, Faenza, v (1917), pp. 33–8
• Treuherz, J. Hard Times: Social Realism in Victorian Art (London, 1987), pp. 36–39

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