“I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future. The Spirits of all Three shall strive within me. I will not shut out the lessons that they teach”
- Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol
Has Christmas lost its meaning?
The project was inspired by the previous “Xmas Project”, which celebrated the magical tradition of Christmas through bright and colourful photographs. Dark Xmas is a moment of rupture that exposes the death of the most celebrated and loved annual festivity.
Christmas has been devoured by an estranged society, lost in blind consumption, hungry for new material goods and craving the next best bargain.
With a succession of provocative images combined with an explosive soundtrack, Charlie Burgio denounces the truth hidden under the veil, hiding behind the jingles, the online deals and the tv commercials, which through the years, have had the power to influence and control the consumers’ minds. Christmas has been killed by a new type of consumerism which distorts the values of Christmas, projecting them into alienating practices of mass consumption and giving life to new rituals that kill tradition.
- Giulia Pavone