Elizabeth Grant Bankson Beatty (Mrs. James Beatty) and Her Daughter Susan  1803

Joshua Johnson was the first known African American painter to gain professional recognition in the United States. Listed in the 1816 Baltimore city directory as a “free householder of Colour,” he had been freed by his enslaver (and father) around 1782 after apprenticing as a blacksmith. Described as “self-taught” in a newspaper advertisement, Johnson attracted local patro...