Ondák’s “Measuring the Universe”

New York’s Museum of Modern Art has a piece called Measuring the Universe by Roman Ondák. It’s a hands-on experience in data visualization. Per the MOMA’s description:

Viewers play a vital role in the creation of Measuring the Universe (2007), by Slovakian artist Roman Ondák (b. 1966). Over the course of the exhibition, attendants mark Museum visitors’ heights, first names, and date of the measurement on the gallery walls. Beginning as an empty white space, over time the gallery gradually accumulates the traces of thousands of people.

Below is a photo from Flickr user profzucker that captures the environment well.

There is a dense band of names between the average heights of women and men. The names get progressively sparser below and above that range. At almost 6′2″, I was near the top edge of the distribution.

Names and heights written on a wall are dense toward the vertical middle and sparser going up or down

Steve’s name and height on the wall, near the top edge of the cluster or people's names/heights

The piece is at the New York MOMA through September 14, 2009.