Take five: moments in the life of portraiture’s unsung hero

CORNELIUS JOHNSON (1593– 1661) is one of the greatest portraitists people have never heard of. His paintings appear in many public galleries and private collections throughout Britain and beyond, but he left this country at the outbreak of the Civil War and has since largely been forgotten by the wider public. Not, however, by art dealer Mark Weiss, who has long had a predilection for Johnson and staged the first comprehensive exhibition on him in 2016. He’s now presenting a mini-show featuring seven works by the 17thcentury painter during London Art Week (June 28–July 5; www.weissgallery.com)

1. Johnson was born in Britain to Dutch parents of German origin. After training in the Netherlands, he began his career as a painter in about 1618, working from the parish of St Ann’s in Blackfriars, then outside the reach of the London guilds and, therefore, friendlier to immigrants

2. A portraitist of choice for the burgeoning upper middle class of lawyers and merchants, as well as aristocrats such as Lord North (right), he became Charles I’s ‘servant in ye quality of Picture Drawer’ on December 5, 1632

3. In his Royal Portraitist role, he painted small-scale pictures of the King’s children, including

Charles II, James II and Mary, Princess of Orange (all at the National Portrait Gallery)

4. Legend has it that he left England because he couldn’t stand to be in the shadow of van Dyck —Charles I’s principal painter—although the Civil War is the more likely cause: Johnson only moved to the northern Netherlands after van Dyck’s death in 1541

5. He worked in Middelburg, Amsterdam and The Hague, where he painted his largest work, portraying the city’s magistrates, before settling in Utrecht, where he died in 1661. Twelve pallbearers carried the coffin at his funeral— a sign of his status