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Instead of those warm and fuzzy holiday feelings, Markus Henttonen's photos of Los Angeles during Christmas will give you the chills.
The Finnish photographer based in Berlin put together a collection of spooky photos showing the dark side of Angeleno holiday decorations. He first started his project in 2011 on his first-time trip to Los Angeles when he became "fascinated the way everything looked and felt," he told LAist.
"The houses, quiet streets, lights and shadows were telling a lot of stories," Henttonen said. "There are no people present in my pictures and that is one reason why it feels a bit strange, ominous."
He spent the next two years photographing these houses, and at one point spent every night with his wife for two weeks in L.A. taking snapshots. The artist used a long exposure on his digital camera to take these photos. Although he would stitch some frames together, most of the pics weren't altered much.
Henttonen, however, did notice a difference between Christmas in our city versus Finland. His views of L.A. aren't all dark as he portrays in his photos. "It is so totally different with green grass and sunshine, warm days and maybe a bit chilly nights," he said. "In Finland it might be really cold and snowing—that is the White Christmas more familiar from my childhood. Nowadays, it seems that it is more often a Black Christmas as we call it in Finland if there is no snow because it is so very dark, basically few hours light a day and very seldom sunshine, more just grey. So, I think the most interesting difference is just that it feels more cheery and happy in L.A."
