Margaretha Haverman (1693-1795)

Margaretha Haverman (1693 - 1795) was a female Dutch still-life painter. She was born in either Breda or Amsterdam and was the daughter of a School master. She studied and trained under the flower painter Jan van Huysum and it is believed that Haverman was the only pupil that van Huysum took under his tutelage. After disappointment in love,  In 1721 Haverman moved to Paris and married the architect Jaques de Mondoteguy. Her husband had worked as a merchant in Amsterdam for 20 years and was a native of Bayonne, France. She followed him to Bayonne where he died in 1939. She then left Bayonne with her two children.  In 1722, she was admitted to the Royal Academy in Paris, but was expelled one year later under the pretext that the piece she presented was not her creation, but the work of her tutor, Jan van Huysum. Although there is scarce information about her life and only two signed paintings (one in The Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the other in the Statens Museum for Kunst), Haverman holds an important place in the Dutch painting scene, one reason being her beautiful and creative colour pigments. She had a freer approach to painting than her more formalised master. Indeed the majority of her pictures manage to combine the austerity of the Dutch with the romantic gaiety of 18th century France.