Las Meninas is a 1656 painting in the Museo del Prado in Madrid, by Diego Velázquez, the leading artist of the Spanish Baroque. It has become one of the most widely analyzed works in Western painting for the way its complex and enigmatic composition raises questions about reality and illusion, and for the uncertain relationship it creates between the viewer and the figures depicted.

The Museo del Prado, officially known as Museo Nacional del Prado, is the main Spanish national art museum, located in central Madrid. It houses collections of European art, dating from the 12th century to the early 20th century, based on the former Spanish royal collection, and the single best collection of Spanish art. Founded as a museum of paintings and sculpture in 1819, it also contains important collections of other types of works. The numerous works by Francisco Goya, the single most extensively represented artist, as well as by Hieronymus Bosch, El Greco, Peter Paul Rubens, Titian, and Diego Velázquez, are some of the highlights of the collection. Velázquez and his keen eye and sensibility were also responsible for bringing much of the museum's fine collection of Italian masters to Spain, now one of the largest outside of Italy.