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# Ryan Gander's avatar has a century of idling ahead
- URL: https://www.killscreen.com/ryan-ganders-avatar-has-a-century-of-idling-ahead/
- Published: 2026-11-12T19:33:54.000Z
- Updated: 2026-11-12T19:34:28.000Z
- Description: Ryan Waiting anchors Maybe at Towner Eastbourne from Saturday, the artist's first UK solo show in nearly 20 years.
- Author: Kill Screen Staff
- Tags: Events, #events, #radar-item, Ryan Gander, Virtual Reality, AI art, Installation, exhibition, United Kingdom

Event details

When

Nov. 14, 2026 through April 11, 2027 (closed Dec. 24 to 26 and Jan. 1). Open from 10 a.m.

Where

Towner Eastbourne, Devonshire Park, Eastbourne, UK.

Admission

Pay What You Can, £5 to £14; free for under 25s.

[See the Towner Eastbourne listing](https://townereastbourne.org.uk/whats-on/maybe-ryan-gander?ref=killscreen.com)

Somewhere on a server, a motion-captured Ryan Gander is whistling to himself, sighing, shifting in place. *Ryan Waiting* (2024) is a live simulation, not a recording, and the avatar's actions write themselves in real time, steered by the time of day and by data pulled from the internet, whether anyone is watching or not. It is scheduled to run for 100 years. From Saturday, it anchors Maybe, Gander's solo exhibition at Towner Eastbourne, the artist's first in the UK in nearly 20 years, where visitors walk into a wrap-around bank of monitors to keep the avatar company.

0:00 

/0:05 

1× 

The avatar at work. Excerpt from [Esther Schipper’s exhibition film](https://www.estherschipper.com/video/39-ryan-waiting-ryan-gander/?ref=killscreen.com); the full version, with sound, has Gander and the commissioners on the work.

 "The work is really about what nothing is, what boredom is," Gander told [FAD Magazine](https://fadmagazine.com/2024/11/26/in-conversation-with-ryan-gander-how-to-feel-deep-and-think-slow/?ref=killscreen.com) when the piece premiered at Esther Schipper in Berlin. "It can be as boring as real life ... it's not entertainment. I'm challenging the attention economy." VIVE Arts, which co-commissioned the work with the gallery, [marked the opening](https://www.instagram.com/p/Dfmiqq-G455/?ref=killscreen.com) with a line worth keeping: somewhere on a server right now, the avatar is waiting.

The show runs through April 11, with For I am a Sign, paintings made with Gander's son, and an animatronic mouse voiced by one of the artist's daughters. The avatar, its mood drifting with the internet's weather, will still be at it long after the lights go out in Eastbourne.

Most coverage cannot sit still long enough for a work like this; we budget for boredom. Radar brings the art end of games to your inbox three mornings a week, free.

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