A Body Without Water

Essay by Isa Radojcic

Inspired by the Los Angeles milieu, Golden’s most recent body of work depicts figures in a world of dissociative and dream-like watery planes filled with sun-drenched pastels. Golden manipulates the fluid plateaus that seem to stretch on as far as the eye can see, distorting her figures so that they appear to be underwater. The viewer is left to question what is seen and what is hidden.

Many cultures, myths, and rituals understand the deep psychic resonance of being immersed in water; from amniotic fluids to flood myths to baptisms, when one enters into water and emerges, one is born anew. Golden’s figures are immersed physically, psychologically, and emotionally in the dense and watery wake of the world outside of oneself. They have entered into a state of consciousness without perceptible limits, forging an indissoluble bond with the external world as a whole. Held within the water, the figures become fractions and fragments and are no longer discernible as bodies.

Each character is seeking their own transgressive freedom; searching for an impossible jouissance, filled with secret longings, fantasies and ideals. Confronted by these explorative visions, which normal consciousness does not reach, the viewer crosses thresholds into previously impenetrable reservoirs.