“When I came to this gallery to see the space the first time, I had this image of many, many, many colorful baby bears,” says Paola Pivi, gazing out at the 70 brightly colored feathered polar bear sculptures situated around the entire top floor of Perrotin in the Lower East Side. “Basically, I saw this; it just came to me.”

The Italian artist imagined the bears in New York, but created them in Anchorage, Alaska, where she lives with her husband, Karma Lama, and son. “We Are the Baby Gang” consists entirely of new work and builds upon her series of larger bears that she’s been creating since 2007. It’s her first show at Perrotin since her exhibition of larger bears opened its former Madison Avenue location in 2013.