A collection of “really relatable” and “inspiring” artwork by Charlotte Johnson Wahl, the mother of former prime minister Boris Johnson, is to go on display at the world’s oldest psychiatric hospital. The exhibition called What It Felt Like will feature paintings the artist, who died in 2021 at the age of 79, created during her time as a patient at London’s Maudsley Hospital in 1974. Mrs Johnson Wahl “never hid” her struggles with mental health, including food phobias, and her work “let the hospital know” that she “didn’t have a great time”, according to Colin Gale, director of the Bethlem Museum of the Mind where the exhibition will be held, and which is based in another former London psychiatric hospital.
Charlotte Johnson Wahl’s Ask, And Get No Reassurance painting (The Estate of Charlotte Johnson Wahl/PA) “We’ve been wanting to do this exhibition for years, but it’s probably truer to say that we never thought it would be possible because it would rely on being in networks that we maybe didn’t have access to. “Our exhibition is very tightly focused on the period of work that was done by Charlotte Johnson Wahl over a period of nine months while she was a patient at the Maudsley Hospital, our sister hospital in Camberwell. “It’s a period of time she’s never hidden.
She’s always been completely open in her lifetime, always completely upfront and transparent about why she was there, and her experiences there. “But it’s the art .
