DAY, Eric H.

The British painter and illustrator Eric H. Day (1900–1995) is a prominent figure in 20th-century military aviation painting in the United Kingdom; born in the United Kingdom in 1900, he developed a prolific artistic career focused on the documentary and artistic representation of historical and combat aircraft, with his technical and artistic work closely linked to the Royal Air Force (RAF), a British military institution for which he carried out numerous official commissions and commemorative illustrations of World War II and postwar fighter and bomber aircraft (highlighting his series of iconic planes such as the Supermarine Spitfire, jet fighter-bombers, and various air patrol models); technically, his output stands out mainly for work on paper using watercolor, ink, and gouache, featuring a formal style characterized by rigorous anatomical and technical accuracy in the drawing of aircraft, combined with an atmospheric treatment of the sky and landscape backgrounds in light glazes, frequently signing his works clearly in the lower corner as "Eric H. Day" or "Eric Day"; passing away in 1995 at the age of 95, his work is currently held in institutional collections linked to British military aviation and his pieces are regularly traded on the secondary market and in UK auction houses specializing in aeronautical art and military history.