Measuring the Universe
Exhibition 13–16 February 2020
Event photograph of Roman Ondák’s performance piece ‘Measuring the Universe’ at A4’s booth at the 2020 Cape Town Art Fair. A white wall is covered with overlapping marks that indicate participant’s height, names and the date of their participation in black felt pen.
Installation view: Roman Ondák’s Measuring the Universe at Cape Town Art Fair 2020, February 13, 2020–February 16, 2020. Image courtesy of A4 Arts Foundation.
Title Measuring the Universe Dates 13–16 February 2020 Location Offsite Tagline A4 invites visitors to participate in a performance work by Roman Ondák, in collaboration with the Rennie Collection, at the Cape Town Art Fair 2020. Credits

Artist:
Roman Ondák

Facilitators:
Obakeng Motsepe
Dudu Lamola
Grace Matetoa

In collaboration with the Rennie Collection, Vancouver.

The Cape Town Art Fair is the city's largest art event, marketplace and exchange. A4 interacts with the fair as a curious participant, offering the public a space to engage with art.

For the duration of the 2020 fair, members of the A4 team offer to measure each visitor's height, recalling their name, as well as the date of their visit, alongside a measuring mark on the booth wall. What starts as a blank wall becomes a collective artwork made by the marks of participants: an iteration of Measuring the Universe by Roman Ondák, which was first performed at Pinakothek der Moderne in Munich in 2007, and later at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York in 2009, and in 2011 at the Tate Modern in London.

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Roman Ondák was born in 1966 in Žilina, Slovakia. His works elevate everyday practises, and perform poetic alterations which blur the boundaries between the quotidian, and art. Transforming these gestures sharpens the viewer's attention to everyday life, asking after assumptions, and taking nothing for granted. Concerned with reproducibility, the audience becomes connected to the work by participating within it. Ondák himself was the first to be measured in Measuring the Universe (2007). “I’m trying to use forms which don’t have such a stable position…so this is a type of work which can have a certain fluidity in terms of appearance" (Roman Ondák, quoted in Interview with Roman Ondák, Deutsche Bank’s Artist of the Year 2012).

Event photograph of Roman Ondák’s performance piece ‘Measuring the Universe’ at A4’s booth at the 2020 Cape Town Art Fair. At the back, a white wall is covered with overlapping marks that indicate participant’s height, names and the date of their participation in black felt pen. At the front, A4’s Obakeng Motsepe measures the height of a fair attendee.
Event: Roman Ondák’s Measuring the Universe at Cape Town Art Fair 2020, February 13, 2020–February 16, 2020. Image courtesy of A4 Arts Foundation.
Event photograph of Roman Ondák’s performance piece ‘Measuring the Universe’ at A4’s booth at the 2020 Cape Town Art Fair. At the back, a white wall is covered with overlapping marks that indicate participant’s height, names and the date of their participation in black felt pen. At the front, A4’s Obakeng Motsepe and group of fair attendees.
Event photograph of Roman Ondák’s performance piece ‘Measuring the Universe’ at A4’s booth at the 2020 Cape Town Art Fair. At the back, a white wall is covered with overlapping marks that indicate participant’s height, names and the date of their participation in black felt pen. At the front, an A4 facilitator ads information to the wall.
Event photograph of Roman Ondák’s performance piece ‘Measuring the Universe’ at A4’s booth at the 2020 Cape Town Art Fair. At the back, a white wall is covered with overlapping marks that indicate participant’s height, names and the date of their participation in black felt pen. At the front, an A4 facilitator measures the height of a fair attendee.
Event photograph of Roman Ondák’s performance piece ‘Measuring the Universe’ at A4’s booth at the 2020 Cape Town Art Fair. At the back, a white wall is covered with overlapping marks that indicate participant’s height, names and the date of their participation in black felt pen. At the front, A4’s Obakeng Motsepe ads information to the wall, with two fair attendees behind him.
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