Catalogue Entry
When Johnson returned to the United States, he not only painted genre paintings but he also continued to paint portraits, which gave him a steady income. After 1880 Johnson turned to portraiture almost exclusively. During the 1880s and 1890s he painted businessmen, lawyers, university presidents, and three U.S. presidents from life. At times he also painted their wives and children.
He was also commissioned to paint posthumous portraits, often from photographs. These portraits by and large do not have the sparkle and active brushwork of those done from life. It seems that the demand for portraits of business and civic leaders (and members of exclusive men’s clubs) was so high that portrait painters would often make copies of each other’s paintings to satisfy the market for such images. In many instances, it has been difficult to render opinions for such paintings. —PH
MacGibeny, 2021: This posthumous portrait of shipbuilder Alfred van Santvoord appears to have been based on a photograph that was reproduced in Harry Brown, The History of American Yachts and Yachtsmen, 1901. Four wood stretchers said to have come from Johnson's painting are in collection of the New-York Historical Society, object number Z.985a-d.
Alfred Van Santvoord (1819–1901). Steamboat company president and ardent yachtsman. Leased or sold vessels to the war department during the Civil War. Known as “Commodore” Van Santvoord because of his life-long association with water transportation. Son of Abraham and Sarah (Hitchcock) Van Santvoord. Married Anna Margaret (m. 1852); father of five children.
White, Terry James. The National Cyclopaedia of American Biography. Ann Arbor, MI: University Microfilms, 1967–.
- Portrait pose:
- Posthumous: