Behind The shot With Alexander Grubl

One photographer. One image. The story behind the shot.

This shot was taken in February of 2005 when I was attending a conference in D.C. With a good friend, we had the spontaneous idea of visiting the US Capitol. When we got there, a long line had formed all the way up to the entrance with hundreds of people waiting. Some of them, obviously without a ticket for the day like us, were asking one of the officers of the Capitol Police what to do, and they were told to "go and ask your congressman."

The sassy me asked the officer on impulse, "What do we do, we don't have a congressman?" "How come?" was his reply, and I told him, "We are from Austria."

He said "Cool, come with me," and he took us all the way up to a makeshift container where the security check was done at the time. We were issued a "Special Visitor Pass," and before we knew it, we were inside the US Capitol. Now it's important to know that we came from the conference, in dark suits, white shirts, and ties. Nobody else was dressed like us.

We spent some time in the Rotunda, where the shot was taken, and on the visitor gallery of Congress. When we exited Congress, we took a right, very friendly greeted by another Capitol Police officer, when we should have turned left. We were obviously taken for lobbyists or someone on official business, because we soon noticed that we were in the inner sanctum of the US Capitol. We ended up in the office of the Majority Leader, where other, heavily armed, Capitol Police officers stopped us. Luckily, we were not arrested, though it felt a bit that way, but only escorted out of the building.

The boy in the image is standing in front of John Trumbull's Declaration of Independence.

You can follow Alexanders work on foto @viennapix