BERLIN.-Between 29 March and 30 April, Roman Ondák will fill the space of the daadgalerie with an installation that will be completed during the opening hours of the gallery. The completed image of Measuring the Universe requires the participation of gallery visitors. Every visitor is requested to mark his height and first name on the wall. This information is supplemented with the date and time of the act. Thus, with the help of the audience a densely populated web of lines, numbers and dates will let an abstract figure grow on the gallery wall during the course of the exhibition. Roman Ondák’s works are often generated with the help of audience participation, or with trained actors. He became known for his works in public spaces, where he placed actors in long queues in front of public institutions.

The horizontal work Measuring the Universe (2007), which was conceived for the Pinakothek der Moderne in Munich is supplemented by a sculpture hung from the ceiling of the gallery. My Winter Shoes Rest in Summer (2007) is a stringy sculpture consisting of a long string of the artist’s shoelaces that he wore last winter. Along with the work he showed in the recent exhibition in Munich entitled My Summer Shoes Rest in Winter, this sculpture completes a pair. Sine the artist continues to use his shoe-strings, both works are never on view simultaneously. Thus, this sculpture will, for a limited period define the space of the gallery and present am image of the respective absent season.

Roman Ondák was born in 1966 in Zilina in Slovakia . Until 1994, he studied at the Academy of Arts in Bratislava . Two years later he took part in the first Manifesta in Rotterdam . In 2003, his work was part of Utopia Station on the 50th Venice Biennial and in 2006, the Tate Modern showed him in a solo exhibition entitled It Will All Turn Out Right in the End. Until early this year the Pinakothek der Moderne in Munich showed him in a solo exhibition. In 2007, Roman Ondák was a stipendiary of the Artists-in-Berlin Program of the DAAD. The artist lives and works in Berlin and Bratislava.