The Broken Kilometer
The Broken Kilometer is a permanent art installation created by Walter De Maria inside a street-level storefront in the SoHo neighborhood of New York City. The piece consists of 500 round solid brass rods, long by in diameter, laid on the floor in 5 rows of 100 rods each. The space between the rods increase by 5 millimeters. The first two rods of each row are placed 80 millimeters apart, the last two rods are placed 570 millimeters apart. The work is illuminated with metal-halide stadium lights. Commissioned by the Dia Art Foundation in 1979, it has been on view to the public ever since. The Broken Kilometer is maintained by the Dia Art Foundation as one of the twelve locations and sites they manage. De Maria's 1977 artwork The Vertical Earth Kilometer in Kassel, Germany, is a companion piece to The Broken Kilometer. Design The Broken Kilometer is composed of 500 identical round solid brass rods that are highly polished. Each rod is long and in diameter. These rods are laid on the ground in five parallel rows of 100 rods each. The first two rods of each row closest to the viewer are placed apart, and the space