The meaning of Las Meninas

Diego Velazquez, Las Meninas. 1656. 

Oil on Canvas, approx. 125.2 in × 108.7 in

This is an famous Italy painting painted by Velazquez in baroque period. It is a life size drawing. 

I' not going to talk about the technique of the painting but mysterious of the painting. Do you see the lightness part of the background is it hanging a mirror with reflection or a lightning portrait?

It's kind of catchy to our eyes because its contrast with dark background. Inside the piece of thing, it's appeared the royal couple faces who are the parents of the princess name La Infanta Margarita. She standing in the center of the foreground with maids serving.

There were 4 different views from the expert of the painting. In the first view, the royal couple stand infront of the position as the viewer. The mirror reflection of the royal couple seems like stand infront of Margarita and the group. Jose Niento who stand behind of the stair case was preparing the passage for them at the stairs, Margarita and  look like curtsy and welcome them. 

The second view of the painting is Margarita was watching her parents being painted. As we stand infront of the painting as her parents position, we see ourselves as royalty.

The third view, Stork and Furuichi is tested the arrangement of all the objects and people with computer-recreation of the painting’s space. He identified the placement of the objects, the light that could influence the reflection of the mirror. In the result, the mirror should be reflected objects in the canvas.

The forth view, Velazquez holding his brushes and looking out from the canvas and the people in the painting seems not looking straight toward the viewer. They were like looking at themselves through the mirror. In the 17 century, artists usually painted their self-portrait with a mirror that known as an artistic tradition. There were 2 way of using this method, transferred 3D object to 2D with mirror and compose image by framing subject on mirror.

In my opinion, I think that thing hanging on the which is glowing is a portrait because the painter wanted us to remember of the pair of royal couple. Usually the royal people like to have their own portrait to hang on their wall. He use the dark color to contrast with the portrait to draw our attention. Even the main character is their daughter, but they still wanna let others to remember them and show that she is their daughter. 
Do you notice that there are a lot people in the painting, all of them were servants of the princess, it show how powerful and authority of the young princess have. Even she was so young, her expression and posture already show her maturity. you will seldom see a child look like this right?

It is a fantastic painting that represent the baroque period of art. It's not just a precious painting , it's also let us to study about the history, culture, habit, fashion and story about that country of that period.  We should appreciate the artworks of all the period before the painting damaged. 

ref:Las Meninas. (n.d.). Retrieved June 28, 2013, from Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Las_Meninas

Konstantinidis, G. (2012). Velazquez - Las Meninas: Interpretation. Retrieved June 30, 2013, from: http://www.velazquezlasmeninas.com/velazquez-las-meninas-interpretation.html