Diego Velázquez (1599-1660) was a Spanish painter from Seville. Las Meninas is set in Velázquez’s studio space at the Royal Alcázar of Madrid, the fortress-turned-palace where the king and his family lived. Hanging on the room’s far wall are copies of works by Peter Paul Rubens, another favorite painter of King Philip IV, which were created by the artist Juan Bautista del Mazo. On the near left is a self portrait of the artist, offering a rare glimpse of a painting being painted in action.

Byron Ellsworth Hamann offers another contextual approach to the reading of 'Las Meninas'. He supposes that the image 'can be linked to the world beyond Madrid, placed within the economic context of mid-seventeenth century Spain and its colonial empire'.

J. H. Elliot further concedes that Diego Velázquez, 'caught in the his paintings the sense of failure and sudden emptiness of the Imperial splendor'.