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Adoration of the Magi
About the Artwork
The drawing is a print design made to be translated to a copperplate in the city of Antwerp in the late 16th century. De Vos’s closely cropped composition brings the three magi as well as Joseph into close contact with the seated Virgin and Child. The elaborate vessels carried by the magi, including a footed nautilus cup, a silver dish, and what could be a coconut cup, are the types of exotic treasures that would have been collected by Antwerp’s wealthy inhabitants signifying their contact with foreign lands. The magi furthest back is portrayed as African, a not uncommon but by no means universal interpretation of the magi’s origins.
Provenance
2010: sold, Bonhams, London, 2010-10-27, lot 20, as attributed to Cornelis de Vos , als: toegeschreven aan Cornelis de Vos 2013-?: with Hawley-Field, United States 2019: Susan Schulman Printseller, New York, NY December 3, 2019: The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
Exhibition history
Tales of the City: Drawing in the Netherlands from Bosch to Bruegel. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (co-organizer) (October 9, 2022-January 8, 2023).
Quick Overview
- Artist
- Maarten de Vos (Flemish, 1532–1603)
- Date
- c. 1590
- Medium
- Pen and brown ink, brush and brown wash; traces of transfer
- Dimensions
- Sheet: 20.3 x 15.9 cm (8 x 6 1/4 in.)
- Type
- Drawing
- Classification
- Drawing
- Department
- Drawings
- Credit line
- Mr. and Mrs. Richard W. Whitehill Art Purchase Endowment Fund
- Accession no.
- 2019.232
More by Maarten de Vos in museum collections
Captain de Bours handing over the Keys to the Citadel of Antwerp to the Estates General
Maarten de Vosmid-16th–early 17th century · Drawing
Data retrieved from the Cleveland Museum of Art on October 8, 2026. The museum may have updated its record since.
Open-access museum record · AT-00011193
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