CHICAGO SPORTS! You Shoulda Been There

This 6,000-square-foot temporary exhibition ran from March 2003 to January 2004 and was located in two galleries on the second floor, connected by a "bridge" across the atrium. The exhibition contained 55 elements grouped in six sections by sports venue and community settings: neighborhoods, Soldier Field, Comiskey Park, Wrigley Field, the Chicago Stadium/United Center, and school sports. The main message of the exhibition was, "In a city of strangers, sports brings people together." The 55 elements included two large video theaters (one in the south gallery, one in the north), four large wall-mounted timelines with multiple stories and graphics depicting major events as well as some real artifacts, several iconographic objects, e.g., Comiskey pinwheel, turnstiles, Cubs on-deck circle, Walter Payton's Super Bowl ring, and a case with the six golden championship trophies won by the Bulls. The bridge between the two halves of the exhibition contained murals of the Wrigley and Addison CTA train stations and a tableau of the inside of a CTA 'L' train car between them. The summative evaluation study was structured to answer a variety of questions, including What did visitors like?, What did they learn?, Did they perceive the exhibit's conceptual organization?, How did design contribute to understanding?, How long did they stay?, What were the most popular elements?, and Who came?

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