The Darker the Night, the Brighter the Stars

The Darker the Night, the Brighter the Stars" is an ode to the youth growing in difficult contexts deprived of opportunities and positive role models. This long-term documentary project explores youth culture in Napoli through the traditional bonfire celebration known as Cippo di Sant'Antonio. Stemming from a pagan tradition where peasants constructed fires with domestic waste to celebrate the end of winter the tradition has taken a peculiar turn in the city of Napoli. Today the ritual sees groups of children aged 6 to 16 taking the streets in balaclavas, stealing Christmas trees, engaging in battles with rival districts, hiding and guarding the loot in secret areas within their territories until the day of the fire. The fire is seen as a threshold that the youths strives to cross through. The game encompasses different dimensions where tropes of friendship, trust, hierarchy, territory, masculinity, law and outlaw are intertwined, naively concealing an alphabet of systemic criminality often present in Southern-Italy. A rite of passage in which the frantic emotional instability typical of the coming of age reaches its climax and burn with the fire sacrificing itself to the civilization. The savagery dominating the creation and lighting up of the fire is followed by a quiet tenderness. Aiming to convey the naivety and beauty of this age the series also provide new ways to visually examine the subject of youth and identity; highlighting the issues affecting the south of Italy and bridging this youth to a broader Mediterranean culture and population.