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Charlotte Johnson Wahl

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"Charlotte Johnson" redirects here. For the physician, see Charlotte Johnson Baker.

Charlotte Maria Offlow Johnson Wahl
Born
Charlotte Offlow Fawcett

(1942-05-29)29 May 1942
Oxford, England
Died13 September 2021(2021-09-13) (aged 79)
London, England
Alma materLady Margaret Hall, Oxford
Spouses
  • ​
    ​
    (m. 1963; div. 1979)​
  • ​
    ​
    (m. 1988; died 1996)​
Children
Parents
Relatives
Websitecharlottejohnsonwahl.com

Charlotte Johnson Wahl (née Fawcett; 29 May 1942[1] – 13 September 2021)[2][3] was a British artist.[4] She was the mother of Boris Johnson, the former prime minister of the United Kingdom, as well as the journalist Rachel Johnson and the politician Jo Johnson.

Early life and education

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Johnson Wahl was born Charlotte Maria Offlow Fawcett in Oxford on 29 May 1942.[1][2] Her father was the English barrister Sir James Fawcett and her mother was Frances Beatrice 1913-2001 Fawcett (née Lowe).[5] Frances was the daughter of Elias Avery Lowe, a Lithuanian-American Jewish palaeographer, and Helen Tracy Lowe-Porter, an American translator and writer, along with Frances's four siblings (including the journalist and author Edmund Fawcett).[6] James was the son of Joseph Fawcett, an English clergyman, and Edith Fawcett (née Scattergood).[7]

In 1961 Johnson Wahl began studying English at Lady Margaret Hall, a college of Oxford University. She took her finals in 1965, the first year the college granted permission for married undergraduates to sit them.[8] She obtained a second-class honours degree.[9][10]

Paintings

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Johnson Wahl was a professional portrait painter for Crispin Tickell, Joanna Lumley, Jilly Cooper, Simon Jenkins, and others. She painted children with their toys and dogs. Additionally, she painted landscapes and still lifes.[8] Jonathan Jones of The Guardian described her paintings as influenced by Vorticism.[8][11]

Johnson Wahl held exhibitions: at the Maudsley Hospital, London, in 1974; in Brussels in 1970s; and at the Gavin Graham Gallery in London in 2004. A retrospective exhibition of her work was displayed at Mall Galleries, London, in 2015.[12][8] The documentary Painting the Johnsons for Sky Arts follows her career.[8]

In 1997 Johnson Wahl painted for a fellowship in Bogliasco, Italy.[8] Her paintings sold for £1,000 to £5,000.[13] Two of Wahl's paintings are in the collection of the Bethlem Museum of the Mind; another two are in the collections of Oxford University colleges.[14]

Personal life

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She met Stanley Johnson at an All Souls lunch hosted by her father to celebrate Johnson's Newdigate Prize for poetry. They married in 1963 and lived in England, the United States, and Brussels.[8] In 1974, Charlotte Johnson Wahl was treated in Belgium for phobias, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and anxiety around her children, which she said her husband was unsympathetic to.[15] In 1979, the couple divorced. Their four children are Boris Johnson, Jo Johnson, Rachel Johnson, and Leo Johnson.[8]

In 2020 Charlotte Johnson Wahl told the biographer Tom Bower that Stanley Johnson had hit her "many times, over many years". Charlotte Johnson Wahl said that the abuse originated from his jealousy when she saw her friends. She stated that Johnson broke her nose, which family friends of his corroborated. On one occasion, he abandoned her without a car.[16][17][18][19]

In 1988 Johnson Wahl married Nicholas Wahl, an American academic who studied French politics. They had met at a dinner party of Tickell in Brussels. They lived together in Washington Square, New York. Wahl died of cancer in 1996.[8]

Johnson Wahl was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease at the age of 40.[10] On 13 September 2021 Johnson Wahl died at St Mary's Hospital in London, at the age of 79.[20][8]

Political views

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In 2015 the Evening Standard referred to Johnson Wahl as "left-wing", with her daughter Rachel stating that her father Stanley "tends to marry socialists".[21] Johnson Wahl said in 2015 that she never voted for the Conservative Party and supported Jeremy Corbyn's leadership of the Labour Party.[15] Rachel commented that her mother was "the only red in the village when we lived on Exmoor".[21] In October 2019, during Boris Johnson's speech to the Conservative Party conference, he said that his mother voted for the United Kingdom to leave the European Union in the 2016 referendum.[22]

References

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  1. ^ a b "Charlotte Johnson Wahl, painter with an original vision who was the 'genius' of the Johnson family and mother of the PM – obituary". The Daily Telegraph. 14 September 2021. Retrieved 14 September 2021.
  2. ^ a b "Charlotte Maria Offlow JOHNSON WAHL". Personal Appointments. Companies House.
  3. ^ Furness, Hannah (13 September 2021). "Boris Johnson's mother dies aged 79". The Telegraph. Retrieved 13 September 2021.
  4. ^ "Charlotte Johnson-Wahl profile". The Times. 15 May 2008. p. 15.
  5. ^ "Index entry". FreeBMD. ONS. Retrieved 18 January 2018.
  6. ^ Peled, Daniella. "Interview: Boris Johnson - my Jewish credentials". www.website.thejc.com. Archived from the original on 19 May 2015. Retrieved 19 August 2023.
  7. ^ Andrews, Deborah (1992). Annual Obituary, 1991. St. James Press. p. 340. ISBN 978-1-55862-175-6. Retrieved 19 August 2023.
  8. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Haynes, Mary (2022). "Charlotte Johnson Wahl (Née Fawcett), 1942–2021" (PDF). The Brown Book. Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford. pp. 118–120. Retrieved 24 October 2023.
  9. ^ "Boris Johnson's mother dies aged 79". Oxford Mail. 14 September 2021. Retrieved 17 September 2021.
  10. ^ a b Killen, Mary (March 2015). "Boris Johnson's mother on her brilliant brood". Tatler. Retrieved 19 January 2018.
  11. ^ Jones, Jonathan (15 May 2008). "What would Boris's artist mum say about his train booze ban?". The Guardian. Retrieved 17 May 2008.
  12. ^ Guy, Jack (14 September 2021). "Artist Charlotte Johnson Wahl, mother of UK Prime Minister, dies age 79". CNN. Retrieved 15 September 2021.
  13. ^ Llewellyn Smith, Julia (17 May 2008). "Boris Johnson, by his mother Charlotte Johnson Wahl". The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 17 May 2008.
  14. ^ Charlotte Johnson Wahl paintings, BBC Your paintings. Retrieved 13 September 2021
  15. ^ a b Ridley, Louise (28 September 2015). "Boris Johnson's Mother Says She's Never Voted Tory And Boris 'Isn't As Daft' As He Seems". HuffPost. Retrieved 24 October 2023.
  16. ^ Rodger, Hannah (4 October 2020). "Stanley Johnson 'broke wife's nose' in domestic violence incident". The Herald. Glasgow. Retrieved 14 September 2021.
  17. ^ Barber, Lynn (22 October 2020). "Tom Bower pulls his punches with his life of Boris Johnson". The Spectator. Retrieved 2 December 2021.
  18. ^ Freedland, Jonathan (13 October 2020). "Boris Johnson: The Gambler by Tom Bower review – the defining secret". The Guardian. Retrieved 13 October 2020.
  19. ^ Bennett, Catherine (12 March 2023). "The wife of 'Sir Stanley' couldn't tolerate his abuse and nor should the rest of us". The Guardian. Retrieved 24 October 2023.
  20. ^ Wright, Oliver (14 September 2021). "Boris Johnson's artist mother dies at 79 after living with Parkinson's". The Times. Retrieved 14 September 2021.
  21. ^ a b "Sleeping with the enemy: meet London's politically cloven couples". Evening Standard. 27 April 2015. Retrieved 23 October 2020.
  22. ^ Devlin, Kate (3 October 2019). "My mother voted to leave the EU, says Boris Johnson". The Times. Retrieved 14 April 2020.
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