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2022 - 2023 Season’s Greetings Series

Season’s Greetings is a series of digitally edited scans of 120 film negatives. Shot on a Holga “toy” camera known for its distortions ranging from blur to light leaks, Wilder peels back the overlapping layers of social constructs embedded in the Christmas holiday in the US by pairing photographs of holiday decorations with text fragments from academic journal articles. A “social construct” is a social mechanism or category developed by society that forwards perception of an individual or group that is created culturally as opposed to biologically. Social constructs include gender, race, religion, and many other groupings that strongly impact an individual’s sense of identity. These social constructs are perpetuated by how a child is raised, language and other communication practices, and visible signs including advertising, popular culture, and education. Social constructs Wilder is exploring in Season’s Greetings with regard to Christmas include aspects of capitalism, Christianity, colonialism, and gender. Many people approach the Christmas holiday in the US with compulsive, ritualized behaviors. A “ritual” is a series of actions performed in a defined sequence. While rituals are often derived from one’s culture and/or religion, Wilder’s ritual in Season’s Greetings is a personal investigation into memory, social constructs, and identity related to the holiday. Wilder uses (in)visibility and concealment as artistic strategies to create works that to varying degrees withhold information viewers may expect or desire.
  • Season’s Greetings: Psychological Dedication to Waste (The Theory of the Leisure Class, Veblen, 1899)
    30 inches by 40 inches
    Digitally Edited Scan of 120 Film (Shot on a Holga), Academic Text
    2022
  • Season’s Greetings: Holiday Gifting Practices Appear Wasteful (Holiday Gifting at a Children’s Hospital, Barnes, 2019)
    30 inches by 40 inches
    Digitally Edited Scan of 120 Film (Shot on a Holga), Academic Text
    2022
  • Season’s Greetings: A Child Can Choose One Path that will Close His Heart (Depend On, Rely On, Count On, Saltmarsh, 2009)
    40 inches by 30 inches
    Digitally Edited Scan of 120 Film (Shot on a Holga), Academic Text
    2022
  • Season’s Greetings: Christmas Certainly Involves the Purchase of Goods Which are Unnecessary (Christmas: An American Paradox, Cramer, 1977)
    40 inches by 30 inches
    Digitally Edited Scan of 120 Film (Shot on a Holga), Academic Text
    2022
  • Season’s Greetings: A Reasonable Tree (How Long is a Piece of Christmas Lighting?, Ellison, 2013)
    40 inches by 30 inches
    Digitally Edited Scan of 120 Film (Shot on a Holga), Academic Text
    2022
  • Season’s Greetings: Giants of Modern Retail (Christmas, Consumption, & Materialism, Batinga, Pinto, & Resende, 2017)
    30 inches by 40 inches
    Digitally Edited Scan of 120 Film (Shot on a Holga), Academic Text
    2022
  • Season’s Greetings: Truly Compulsive Behaviors (It’s the Thought that Counts, Pollay, 1987)
    40 inches by 30 inches
    Digitally Edited Scan of 120 Film (Shot on a Holga), Academic Text
    2022
  • Season’s Greetings: The Effect of Advancing Religion (A Christmas Issue, Hartenstein, 1992)
    30 inches by 40 inches
    Digitally Edited Scan of 120 Film (Shot on a Holga), Academic Text
    2022
  • Season’s Greetings: All Traditional Rituals Have Been Invaded By Commercial Aspects (Attitudes on Commercialisation and Anti-Commercial Reactions on Gift-Giving Occasions in Belgium, Mortelmans & Damen, 2001)
    40 inches by 30 inches
    Digitally Edited Scan of 120 Film (Shot on a Holga), Academic Text
    2022
  • Season’s Greetings: An Act of Largely Political Expediency (A Christmas Carol, Hancock, 2016)
    40 inches by 30 inches
    Digitally Edited Scan of 120 Film (Shot on a Holga), Academic Text
    2022
  • Season’s Greetings: Threat to Men (Myth, Identity, and Social Interaction, Thompson & Hickey, 1989)
    40 inches by 30 inches
    Digitally Edited Scan of 120 Film (Shot on a Holga), Academic Text
    2022
  • Season’s Greetings: Many Unbalanced Exchanges (Rule Enforcement without Visible Means, Caplow, 1984)
    30 inches by 40 inches
    Digitally Edited Scan of 120 Film (Shot on a Holga), Academic Text
    2022
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