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If you go to the Museo Del Prado in Madrid, you can look at a painting that seems to know you are there. It's called Las Meninas, or The Maids of Honour, and it's the greatest masterpiece produced by Diego Velazquez, a 17th century artist who only really seemed to deal in masterpieces.I've just finished reading The Vanishing Man, by Laura Cumming, an absolutely brilliant book that makes the case for Velazquez in general and Las Meninas in particular. I'm left with the feeling that it might be the most thrilling work of art I've ever seen. Cumming's reading of Las Meninas is electrifying, presenting this huge canvas depicting a young princess and her attendants, as a profound exploration of the relationship between the people in paintings and the people who come to look at them.
"You are here, you have appeared," writes Cumming. "This is the split-second revelation in their eyes, all these people looking back at you from their side of the room.The princess in her shimmering dress, the maids in their ribbons and bows, the tiny page and the tall, dark painter, the nun whose murmur is just fading away and the chamberlain silhouetted in the glowing doorway at the back: everyone registers your presence... Now you have entered the room - their room, not the real one around you... You have walked into their world and become suddenly as present to them as they are to you."
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