A Pioneering American Portraitist: The Life and Art of Joshua Johnson Joshua Johnson, often hailed as the first African-American professional artist, remains a figure shrouded in mystery yet undeniably significant in the annals of early American art. Born in 1763, his life story is pieced together from fragments – advertisements, bills of sale, and the portraits themselves, which offer the most compelling evidence of his existence and talent. Unlike many artists of his time whose biographies are well-documented through academies and patronage networks, Johnson emerged from relative obscurity…