Kitchen Scene with a Maid Drawing Poultry, the Parable of the Rich Man and the Poor Lazarus, from Kitchen and Market Scenes with Biblical Scenes in the Background

Art Historical Context

Jacob Matham’s engravingKitchen Scene with a Maid Poultry* (ca 1603) captures lively domestic world of seventeenth-century Dutch kitchen while a moral lesson in its background. A young maid plucks and prepares poultry amid baskets of produce and kitchen utensils, her figure rendered with crisp, precise lines typical of engraving. Behind her, through an open doorway, Matham depicts the biblical Parable of the Rich Man and the Poor Lazarus, a subtle reminder of charity and humility amid everyday abundance. As a leading Dutch engraver and stepson of Hendrik Goltzius, Matham worked in the late Mannerist tradition, translating paintings into widely circulated prints. This first state of the engraving belongs to a series of kitchen and market scenes that juxtapose ordinary labor with biblical narratives, a popular device in Northern European art of the period. Such works allowed viewers to reflect on spiritual themes while admiring the detailed rendering of food, birds, and household activity. Printed on a modest sheet measuring roughly 9 by 13 inches, the work exemplifies how engravings democratized art, carrying both visual pleasure and ethical instruction into homes across Europe. Today it resides in the Metropolitan Museum’s collection of prints and drawings, where it continues to illustrate the rich interplay between daily life and religious storytelling in the Dutch Golden Age.

About the Artist

Jacob Matham · 1571–1631

**Jacob Matham: Master Engraver of Haarlem** Jacob Matham was born on October 15, 1571, in Haarlem, in the Northern Netherlands, into a burgeoning artistic milieu. Following his father's early death, his mother married the renowned painter and engraver Hendrick Goltzius in 1579, who adopted the young Jacob and trained him rigorously in the workshop as his stepson and pupil. Matham's first signed ...