A deconstruction of the relationship between viewer and viewed, depiction and depicted, Las Meninas asks, Just what is it you think you're looking at?

At first glance, Diego Velázquez's 1656 painting Las Meninas might seem like just another ensemble portrait. But then, your eye snags on some curious detail. Soon you can't look away, locked into ...

Diego Velázquez’ 1656 painting Las Meninas has long been considered one of the most important pieces of Western art. Depicting a scene in the Spanish court during the reign of King Philip IV, the ...

A small clay pot in Diego Velázquez’s Las Meninas could hold the key to unlocking the mysterious 17th-Century painting, argues Kelly Grovier.

SPAIN - MAY 15: Las Meninas (The Maids of Honour), 1656, by Diego Velazquez (1599-1660), oil on canvas, 318x276 cm. (Photo by DeAgostini/Getty Images); Madrid, Museo Del Prado. (Photo by ...

Diego Velázquez’s “Queen Mariana of Austria” (1652-53), a monumental portrait of the daughter of the Hapsburg Emperor Ferdinand III, is at the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena, Calif ...

A small clay pot in Diego Velázquez’s Las Meninas could hold the key to unlocking the mysterious 17th-Century painting, argues Kelly Grovier.

A small clay pot in Diego Velázquez’s Las Meninas could hold the key to unlocking the mysterious 17th-Century painting, argues Kelly Grovier. Sometimes a vase is just a vase. Sometimes it’s a ...