Home / Art / Installation

‘Measuring the Universe’ Installation Invited Visitors to Record Their Names and Height

By Emma Taggart on July 29, 2025

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by JAUZ (@jauzcl)

Remember marking your height on a wall with a pencil when you were a kid? The nostalgic tradition of tracking growth inspired Roman Ondák’s 2007 installation Measuring the Universe. But instead of measuring only his own family, Ondák invited every visitor at MoMA in New York to participate. Each person stood against the wall, where someone would mark their height and label it with their first name and the date of their visit.

Measuring the Universe ran for almost three months at MoMA, and throughout that time, thousands of visitors had their heights recorded. The resulting signatures created a bold, uneven black line that slowly took shape around the walls of the gallery. Ondák himself was the first to be measured, and over time, the recorded measurements revealed the diversity of the people who visited, from the very tallest to the smallest. There was also a denser band of signatures, suggesting an average height and creating a sense of common ground amid the variation.

People of all ages came to add their mark on the interactive installation, creating a powerful representation of human life. Ondák explained, “The idea is taken from a habit of parents to measure children.”

At the time, the artist did this with his own two sons, and began to think about how these simple wall markings powerfully indicate the passage of time. He said, “I was thinking about this very peripheral and marginal moment of everyday life to be expanded and transformed to the context of the exhibition.”

The exhibition provided a simple way for the visitors to physically mark their existence. When you look at everyone’s height next to each other, you realize how much our own size and perspective shape the way we see the world. It’s a poignant way of revealing how we try to make sense of huge, abstract ideas—like the universe—by relating them to something we know best: ourselves.