In My Past Paradise, Julia Thompson crafts unstable, seductive forms from scented materials such as soap, vodka, lipstick, eye shadow, echoing the elusive promises of beauty and control. Using the aesthetics of mass-produced femininity, the allure of these objects unveils the transient nature of their existence. Like bottled memories, they ooze vulnerability: they melt, decay, and react to their surroundings, mirroring the artist’s own experience of anxiety and shifting recollection. What begins as perfection becomes sticky, slumped, and spoiled, desperately trying to hold together the toxic ideals we abide to.