Aug. 26--The Field Museum laid off four exhibitions department employees Monday and told 17 contract workers aligned with the department that their contracts would not be renewed, a museum spokeswoman said Tuesday.
After the move, the exhibitions department is left with 64 staffers, said interim Public Relations Director Emily Waldren. She said the 17 contract, or "term," workers have deals that expire in December or in early 2016.
Waldren said the changes, which follow the June opening of a major new permanent exhibition, the Cyrus Tang Hall of China, were made because of uncertainty about future exhibition plans and funding.
"We had a lot of capacity for Hall of China and (a traveling exhibition on) mummies," said Ray DeThorne, the museum's chief marketing officer. "Both projects are done, and we are pausing to monitor the traveling exhibitions business globally before we start another big project. We have no other terminations planned."
The Chicago natural history museum in recent years has gone through major layoffs, including in its scientific and curatorial staff, to try to get costs in line after overspending on capital improvement projects. The latest cuts, Waldren said, are not of a piece with those earlier ones.
"This is a look at restructuring and future plans," she said. "It's part of thinking critically about how we're moving forward."
sajohnson@tribpub.com
