Universally recognized as a brilliant and gifted 18th-century artist, Johan Zoffany (1733-1810) was regarded by Horace Walpole as one of the three greatest painters in England, along with his friends Reynolds and Gainsborough. Yet he has remained without a detailed study of his life and works, owing to the fascinating and complex vicissitudes of his career, now established from widely scattered sources. From being a late-baroque painter at a German princely court to working under the royal patronage of George III and Queen Charlotte, from his serious interest in Indian life and landscape,...