Boris Johnson’s artist mom is a Mind mental health heroine
Bethlem hospital’s centuries-old, dark history of madness, hangs ominously over the peaceful estate. Cibber’s arresting statues Melancholy and Raving Madness greet me as I climb up the staircase to the gallery on the first floor. Right before me hangs Charlotte Johnson Wahl’s expressive self portrait It Has Not Worked .
The oil painting screams anguish and pain. Charlotte’s distorted, outstretched hands give the haunted human figure a childlike aura, while the lunatic asylum setting adds poignancy to the hand written title.
“Your painting is the first one visitors to the gallery see” I tell Charlotte as we speak at her Notting Hill flat, surrounded by a sea of brushes, paint tubes and family photos of Boris and his three siblings.
“I am glad to learn that it is the very first painting you see” she replies with a charming smile, ”it was done in such despair” she adds pointing to the “terrible sorrow and distress” in the painting. “It was painted in 1974 during a dark time in my life and a rather long stay at The Maudsley hospital,” she explains, “it was awful, I was trying to get rid of my rituals, obsessions, fear of dirt and dislike of food. I thought they could help me get rid of those obsessions but they couldn’t”.
Charlotte Johnson Wahl had spent nine months at the Maudsley hospital that year where she was given canvasses and paints, “I couldn’t talk about my problems but I could paint them” she reflects.
The stay bore fruit to seventy eight “glimpses into the artist’s troubled psyche” and a solo exhibition at the hospital’s renowned gallery. “It was a success and I even sold a great number of the paintings”, recalls Charlotte, “but there was always the pain of being away from the children who were little at the time, this was the worst thing, I left Jo, my youngest when he was still very little and when I came back I felt like he didn’t know me”.
I reassure Charlotte with details of my recent conversation with Jo who remembers a “wonderfully happy childhood with a very busy mum looking after us all” and she smiles. “yours is a thoroughly impressive brood” I tell Charlotte, “ they are all stars in their respective fields”.
Jo Johnson is the member of parliament for Orpington and an award-winning editor, famous Boris is the UK’s foreign secretary, Leo is a well known environmentalist while fourth sibling Rachel Johnson is a respected writer and commentator.
“I am just a mother proud of her children“ ”she replies, her voice a touch incoherent from Parkinson’s disease which has affected her for over forty years. “To answer your earlier question” she adds, “I do not mind being referred to as Boris’s mum, it’s a testament to his achievements”.
Painting has been a constant in Charlotte’s often troubled life, from children’s portraits with their father Stanley, to expressive documents of poor mental health and consuming anxiety. Charlotte painted through her 1978 divorce from Stanley Johnson, second husband Nicholas Wahl‘s long battle with Cancer and his devastating death.
Charlotte is an “undefeated” spirit says family friend Nell Butler; she supported herself through sales of her art (Jilly Cooper and Joanna Lumley are among her collectors) and when illness forced her to separate from her children she bounced back with relentless devotion and love.”
With mental health in the spotlight, it is reassuring to see figures like Charlotte Johnson speak openly and candidly about their battles. Perhaps this will help lighten the burden of guilt carried by fellow mums afflicted by post natal depression and stress and show that with the right help and support, as in Charlotte’s case, these battles can be won.
