Sculptor Janny Baek is presenting her solo exhibition *Life Forms* at Chicago's Joy Machine gallery from March 20 to May 9, 2026. The exhibition features her speculative ceramic sculptures, which blend recognizable natural forms like blossoms and creatures with unexpected, abstract elements to create imagined landscapes and primordial organisms. Using techniques like hand-building and the Japanese *nerikomi* method of patterning colored clay, Baek's work captures beings in a state of playful mutation and transformation.
The exhibition marks Baek's Chicago debut and is significant for its exploration of change as an inevitable and alluring force. Her practice, hovering between abstraction and representation, challenges viewers to reconsider how they interpret the natural world, presenting a vision where growth, dissonance, and metamorphosis are central to both artistic creation and our understanding of life itself.