 The Rhondda Valleys has not produced as notable a group of visual artists as it has writers , though in the 1950s a small group of students , brought together through a daily commute by train to the Cardiff College of Art , came to prominence and are known as the ' Rhondda Group ' . Although they did not set up a school or have a manifesto ; the group , which included Charles Burton , Ceri Barclay , Glyn Morgan , Thomas Hughes , Gwyn Evans , Nigel Flower , David Mainwaring , Ernest Zobole and Robert Thomas , were an important artistic movement in 20th @-@ century Welsh art . The most notable members of the group include Ernest Zobole , a painter from Ystrad , whose expressionist work was deeply rooted in the juxtaposition of the industrialised buildings of the valleys set against the green hills that surround them . Also from the Rhondda Fawr was sculptor Robert Thomas ; born in Cwmparc , his heavy cast statues have become icons of contemporary Wales , with five of his statues publicly displayed in the centre of Cardiff . 
