Magdalena van de Passe was an engraver and important member of the Van de Passe family of artists from Cologne who were active in the Northern Netherlands.

Biography

According to the RKD she was the daughter of the engraver Crispijn van de Passe, and the sister of Simon, Crispijn II en Willem. In her lifetime she was quite famous and signed her first works at the age of 14, two years younger than her brothers. When she was 33 or 34, she married the artist Frederick van Bevervoordt, but he died two years later. She taught Anna Maria Schurman engraving.

Like her siblings, she assisted her father with his engraving projects. She is known for landscapes and portraits, but also collaborated with her brother Willem on 65 engravings for Henry Holland

Henry Holland (printer)

-Life:The son of Philemon Holland, was born at Coventry on 29 September 1583. He came to London as a youth, and usually designated himself ‘Londonopolitanus.’ He was made free of the Stationers' Company 5 December 1608....

's Heroologia Anglica, published in 1620. She helped her father with an illustration to Karel van Mander's translation of Ovid

Ovid

Publius Ovidius Naso , known as Ovid in the English-speaking world, was a Roman poet who is best known as the author of the three major collections of erotic poetry: Heroides, Amores, and Ars Amatoria...

's Metamorphoses, but this major project was never completed.
She was friends with the painter Adriaen van de Venne

Adriaen van de Venne

Adriaen Pietersz van de Venne , was a versatile Dutch Golden Age painter of allegories, genre subjects and portraits, as well as a miniaturist, book-illustrator and designer of political satires and a versifier.-Biography:...

, who wrote a poem dedicated to her, as did the family friend Arnold Buchelius. She was granted a patent from the States General for the manufacture of sleeping caps printed with engravings of popular figures. Though these seem to have been quite popular, none survive today.