Hanging in El Prado in Madrid, the huge painting has entranced, mystified, and touched its viewers for centuries, inspiring the works of Foucault and Picasso. It continues to defy analysis to this day, despite being the most written-about painting in history. Unfortunately, he did not get the chance to make a royal connection, but only a year later he was summoned back to paint a portrait of Philip.
Inspired by the works of the Italian Renaissance artists , he developed an extraordinary style that epitomized but transcended the Baroque. His lifelike and vivid paintings were unparalleled among his peers and would go on to inspire countless future artists across Europe. Las Meninas is one of those paintings known for attracting huge crowds. Like the Mona Lisa or The Birth of Venus, visitors can spend hours gazing at the canvas, moving from side to side, forwards and backwards to try and take in every element.
Upon seeing Las Meninas for the first time, one is faced with innumerable questions. Luckily, scholars have been studying the painting for so long that there are at least some clear facts:. Taking center stage is the young Infanta Margaret Theresa, flanked by her Meninas, the daughters of royal officials. To their right are two dwarfs, entertainers at the court, accompanied by a great German Shepherd.
The onlookers? The spectators to come? Philip and Mariana are both outside the painting and within it. The mirror puts the King and Queen in the same position as the viewer, with the figures in the central image staring at us, just as we stare at them. One of the most engaging and yet elusive characters in Las Meninas is that of the man standing in the doorway. Kleinbauer, W.
Research guide to the history of western art. Chicago: ALA. December 9, Share on Twitter Share on Facebook Email. Posted in Highlights. Related Posts August 11, June 16, He interpreted the passion with which I spoke about painting as my way of sublimating sexual frustration.
He told me that what I really needed was a girlfriend, and that I would be better off going to bars and discos than spending so many hours visiting monuments and museums. Though I would gradually recognise the truth of his words, their immediate impact was to irritate me profoundly, as did his subsequent gesture of walking off in the direction of a young woman whom he said was more beautiful than any of the pictures we had seen.
It was as if he had violated the inner sanctuary of a temple. What I never lost was my fascination with Las Meninas , partly because it was so tied up with my developing relationship with Spain and the Hispanic world. For, as I began returning to Spain with ever greater frequency, and as a passion for life subsumed one for art, I came almost to think of the painting as a watchful, background presence, accompanying me as I became progressively more caught up with a country moving from a repressive dictatorship to a vibrant democracy, to a disenchanted place on the verge of collapse.
Of encouraging me perhaps to head deeper into what I would soon perceive as an ever-expanding labyrinth. So I decided, as I neared the age of 60, to look more closely at a painting that is famously a mystery. A mystery that at first sight might not seem like one.
A work that could easily strike the viewer simply as a realistic portrayal of Spanish court life, with the artist painting in his studio, and a young princess visiting him there with her retinue. Palomino was lucky enough to have been able to research his account of Las Meninas when there were still people around with memories of when it was painted. He is a reliable source. And no one at first would doubt him, or think of Las Meninas as anything other than an informal, ingenious and exceptionally lifelike portrait of an extended family which the artist has proudly come to feel part of.
Indeed it was as a marvel of naturalism, as an almost photographic representation of reality, that the painting first achieved international recognition, from the early 19th century onwards, during a period in art when the search for such qualities became a dominant obsession. But there is something about Las Meninas that ultimately persuades the viewer that there is much more to it than what immediately meets the eye.
The way in which all of the figures appear isolated in their own worlds.
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