Launch of Ryan Gander commission, 'Things just happened to him', in Atlanta

16 October 2024

The City of Atlanta celebrates ‘ELEVATE’, five decades of art and culture this year with a dynamic lineup of events and new public sculptures. Things just happened to him (2017) by Ryan Gander has now been unveiled in Grant Park. Consisting of a trio of three-metre polished stainless steel sculptures that represent chess pieces in a checkmate position. As each piece is made from the same material in the same colour, it is impossible to tell which of the fictional opposing players are in the lead.

Things just happened to him is a twin to Gander's earlier set of abstracted chess pieces for the Beswick community hub regeneration project in Manchester, UK, titled Dad's Halo Effect (2014), inspired by sketches made by his father while working in a car factory outside the city in the 1980s. Gander began this process by making actual-sized chess pieces from machined steel and anodised aluminium: each one taking on the physical attributes of the King, Queen, Bishop and so on.

The artist said, "It’s amazing to see something that started its life as a story told to me by my father over 40 years ago, come to life as a physical entity. The idea for a chess set came from the engineering components of a Bedford truck found in the car factory in which he worked. This artwork, to me, proves two things and provokes many more. The first is that the stories we tell ourselves can define our actual physical trajectories for life. The second, that creativity is not bound to the artistically trained, it is an innate human activity that is merely orchestrated by the artistically trained. Thanks for the enlightenment, Dad. Let the game begin."

The sculpture was commissioned by the Mayor’s Office of Cultural Affairs, acquired through the Renew Atlanta Infrastructure Bond’s Landmark Public Art initiative.