Reaction to "Las Maninas" by Velazquez

When my family went to the Prado Museum in Madrid, each of us was told told to  pick a painting to write about and I chose Las Meninas created in 1656 by Diego Velazquez. Take a look at this work of art and you can clearly see the light shining on the realistic looking girl in the center, making her stand out. Not only does the girl look realistic, she is based on a real person, and in fact, was a princess named Infanta Margareta standing with her ladies in waiting beside her. Velazquez smartly painted this when looking in a mirror and that is the reason he is seen in the painting along with everything around Margareta. Picasso studied this image and recreated it, surprisingly, 58 times in cubism form. I enjoyed seeing some of the versions Picasso painted before I went to the Prado museum and saw the original ten foot by nine foot one in the Prado. Las Maninas was a pleasure to see because of the way it was painted, the details, and the glimpse of a royal life I got from seeing it.