Joy Baek
Joy Baek, Nothing Edible, Everything Sensible, 2022. Photo by Alan Dimmick Joy Baek, The Ode to Grandmother Flowers, 2022. Photo by Alan Dimmick Joy Baek, Nothing Edible, Everything Sensible, 2022. Photo by Alan Dimmick Joy Baek, Nothing Edible, Everything Sensible, alongside work by Li Huang, Ashanti Harris and Sekai Machache. Photo by Alan Dimmick
Joy Beak is a Korean artist based in Glasgow. She uses her ceramic and metal-work installations to elevate the voices of marginalised women in Scottish and Korean Society.
These works use the imagery of the symbolic flower, Pulsatilla Koreana (the so-called Grandmother flower), from Korean folklore to highlight the sacrifice and unconditional love of family.
The Ode to Grandmother Flowers-the second line, 2022. Mix of iron powder and plaster, latex, rusted metal
Nothing Edible, Everything Sensible: How I Recognized Her Waiting_1, 2022. Stoneware ceramic, gelatine, wire, plaster
Joy Baek: Even though my research tends to, kind of, concentrate on the narratives of other community, or sometimes purely about materials, they all kind of stem from my identity, like as a Korean, as an East Asian woman living in the Western land, and a woman in, you know her 20s.
Biography
Joy Baek is a Korean artist based in Glasgow. Adopting a multidisciplinary practice, Baek explores art as a line of dialogues which record the history of our times. Addressing the socio-cultural issues in Korean and Scottish society, Baek’s work embodies both public and private interpretations of women’s lives. Her desire to render silenced voices heard has led her to develop an activist ethos that strives to sustain the action of elevating these voices, as demonstrated in her long-term series of work. Having graduated with a Fine Art (BA) from the Chelsea College of Arts in London, Baek has since graduated from the MFA at the Glasgow School of Art.
Baek’s performance works were featured in Tramway TV by Tramway, Glasgow, and were recently selected to be on display in Citizen M, Glasgow. Since her graduation, she has been actively working and presenting her works in London and Glasgow, including Through the Crowd at 10 Greatorex Street in London, (2022) and Love and Legacy: Our Grandmothers at French Street Studio and Gallery in Glasgow, (2022). Baek is a recipient of the Gilbert Bayes Grant in 2022 and was chosen for the residency programme at Centre for Contemporary Arts, Glasgow, for 2023.