Adriaen Matham (1590 – 1660) was aDutch Golden Age painter, engraver and art dealer. He was part of an embassy to theSaadi dynasty of Morocco and also made some engravings while there. He married three times, once inAmsterdam and later lived inThe Hague in the 1650s before his death.
He was born inHaarlem as the son of the engraverJacob Matham and his wife Marijtgen or Maria van Poelenburgh.[1] He was the brother of the engraversJan andTheodor Matham, and became a member of theHaarlem St. Adriaen civic guard from 1624 to 1627.[2]
In 1620 he engraved a series of prints on theCounts of Holland that were only published after his death in 1663. He was painted byFrans Hals in his role as flag-bearer of the guard in 1627. He made drawings after Hals' paintings, most notably his sketch of a portrait ofIsaac Massa (a merchant to Russia) and his sketch ofPieter van den Broecke.
In 1640, Matham was a member of a Dutch embassy to theking of Morocco,Mohammed esh Sheikh es Seghir, led byAntonius de Liedekerke.[3] They were received byJan Janszoon, a notorious pirate, who was visited by his daughter Lysbeth and her husband.[4] Then the embassy visited the king inMarrakesh.[3]
Adriaen Matham made a famous drawing and an engraving of theEl Badi Palace, before it was destroyed.[3] He also visited the harbour ofMogador in 1641, where he noted the presence ofJews, who were trading with the Netherlands and England.[5] He made many sketches of fish that he saw on his travels.[6] On his return journey to the Netherlands, he visitedMadeira, with the crew of another ship on board, who had been kept in Morocco as slaves.
He lived inThe Hague as an art dealer around the year 1654.[7] Adriaen collaborated with or sold his work to the cartographerJoan Blaeu[8] and worked forAdriaen van de Venne.
![Temptress woman, devil, alchemist, by Adriaen Matham[9]](/mt/?noimg=&dark=on&url=http%3a%2f%2fen.wikipedia.org%2fwiki%2fFile%3aTemptress_woman%2c_devil%2c_alchemist%2c_by_Andriaen_Matham.jpg)
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