Ophelia is an 1851–52 painting by British artist Sir John Everett Millais in the collection of Tate Britain, London.

The work encountered a mixed response when first exhibited at the Royal Academy, but has since come to be admired as one of the most important works of the mid-nineteenth century for its beauty, its accurate depiction of a natural landscape, and its influence on artists from John William Waterhouse and Salvador Dalí to Peter Blake, Ed Ruscha and Friedrich Heyser.

But eventually, "her garments, heavy with their drink, / Pull'd the poor wretch from her melodious lay" down "to muddy death".

The painting is known for its depiction of the detailed flora of the river and the riverbank, stressing the patterns of growth and decay in a natural ecosystem.

Millais's close colleague William Holman Hunt was at the time working on his The Hireling Shepherd nearby.

Millais painted the water vole out of the final picture, although a rough sketch of it still exists in an upper corner of the canvas hidden by its frame.

[4] In keeping with the tenets of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood (PRB), of which he was a member, Millais used bright colours, gave high attention to detail and faithful truth to nature.

All this is evident in the vivid attention to detail in the brush and trees around Ophelia, the contouring of her face, and the intricate work Millais did on her dress.

Millais had Siddall lie fully clothed in a full bathtub in his studio at 7 Gower Street in London.

"[11] In the 20th century, Salvador Dalí wrote glowingly in an article published in a 1936 edition of the French Surrealist journal Minotaure about the artistic movement that inspired the painting.

The sleeve of the 1971 psychedelic folk album Beautiful Lies You Could Live In by Tom Rapp and Pearls Before Swine reproduces the painting.

[13] A scene in Wes Craven's 1972 film The Last House on the Left was modelled on the painting,[14] while the video for Nick Cave's song "Where the Wild Roses Grow" depicts Kylie Minogue mimicking the pose of the image.

The imagery of the painting is evoked in the prologue of Lars von Trier's 2011 film Melancholia, where Kirsten Dunst's character Justine floats in a slow-moving stream.