Golden Colors

At the height of the depression in the 1930s, Sam Golden joined his uncle Leonard Bocour as a partner in Bocour Artist Colors. Leonard and Sam produced hand-ground oil colors for artists. The shop on 15th Street in Manhattan became a hangout for artists from the 1930s through the early 1950s. Artists such as Barnett Newman, Mark Rothko, Willem de Kooning, Jackson Pollock, Helen Frankenthaler and Jack Levine would go to the shop to visit with Leonard, talk to Sam and get paint.

During one visit an artist gave Sam a honey like resin and asked if it could be made into paint. Sam recognized that this idea would require experimentation as the early batches of the new paint seemed to dry before the paint was applied. Between 1946 and 1949, and after much trial and error, the first artist acrylic paint was ready for production. One of the earliest artists to use the paint "Magna", was Morris Louis. Sam eventually developed a more popular waterborne version of the acrylic, "Aquatec." He continued to refine the chemistry of acrylic paints working with artists for the next 20 years to find what worked and what did not.

After 30 years in the paint making business, Sam retired and moved to picturesque New Berlin, New York. Sam planned to fish and golf, but quickly grew bored with retirement and found himself "going to the barn to make paint for friends." At the age of 67 Sam decided to come out of retirement.

Golden Artist Colors, Inc. began in June of 1980 in a 900 square foot, renovated barn. Sam, his wife Adele, son Mark and daughter-in-law Barbara Golden along with partner Chuck Kelly, founded a new company that would embody Sam's dedication to professional artists, work Sam described as simply "making tools for artists."

The first four years were financially challenging. Sam and Adele used every resource they had to keep the business alive. Mark took weekly trips to New York City to sell products to artists and continue the conversation that had made Bocour so successful.

The business began to succeed with very loyal support the product was gaining from professional artists.