I have been intrigued by this photograph for many years and finally made the effort to find out about the image and the photographer who captured it. Titled Día del libro or  Book Day, 1932, the picture was created by Gabriel Casas.

Working mainly in Barcelona during the 1920s and 30s, Casas was one of the most influential Spanish photographers of the interwar period. He was an early adopter of the pictorial language that became known as New Vision, a movement started in Germany which stirred up the photography field with the use of surprising framing, low angle and high angle shots, light and shape contrasts, and photomontage.

Gabriel Casas managed to add a psychological component to his photographs beyond simple formal aesthetics. His photographs had a huge impact, illustrating magazines, advertisements, books, and even propaganda posters.

Did he wait for someone to fill the empty frame of the window?  Or maybe he took other photos of passers-by pausing to look at the display of books before this perfect moment occurred. Or possibly he staged the picture by asking the boy, who might have been someone he knew, to press his face and hands against the glass?  But none of that matters in the slightest. It’s a great image.

I think that it resonates so much for me because when I was that age, and already a budding bibliophile, I could only long for new books in a real bookstore. All of my reading material came from the library or the flea market.