exhibition

Pluralexhibitions

1. 1
   nouncountable

   A large-scale public showing of objects or products before an audience.

   Companies unveiled their latest gadgets at the trade exhibition.

   The traveling dinosaur exhibition booked out months in advance.

   Similarshow, fair, exposition, expo, exhibit

2. 2
   nouncountable

   A demonstration of one's personal skill or feelings before others.

   The gymnast gave a breathtaking exhibition of strength and balance.

   His tearful speech was an unguarded exhibition of grief.

   Similardisplay, demonstration, show, manifestation, expression

   Note

   A sense that can praise as easily as blame. An exhibition of skill is something to admire, unlike the embarrassing display. It usually takes of plus what is shown: strength, grief, emotion. Letitia Elizabeth Landon's Francesca Carrara (1834) uses it for feeling, "the very exhibition of emotion", in a passage that sets real feeling against affected feeling.

3. 3
   nouncountable

   An act of exhibiting something, or the thing that is exhibited.

   The curator arranged the exhibition with careful attention to lighting.

   Visitors lingered longest at the exhibition near the entrance.

   Similardisplay, show, exhibit, showing, presentation

   Note

   The general sense, and the one the word's build makes plain: exhibit plus -ion, by way of Old French exhibicion. Like many -ion nouns, it names both the act and its result, the exhibiting and what gets exhibited. It can be counted (an exhibition) or used as a mass noun for the activity itself. The narrower uses, from the public show to the student award, all start here.

4. 4
   nouncountable

   A public display, whether deliberate or not, usually regarded as something negative.

   The senator's drunken exhibition at the gala dominated the next day's headlines.

   Throwing his racket made an undignified exhibition of his temper.

   Similardisplay, spectacle, show, scene

   Note

   Here the display reflects badly on whoever makes it, and the disapproval usually arrives in an adjective: a shameful exhibition, a disgusting exhibition. The verb that goes with it is make. Someone makes an exhibition, or makes an exhibition of their temper. George Harrison's "Stuck Inside a Cloud" (2002) turns it on himself, confessing that he made one and lost his appetite.

5. 5
   nouncountable

   A game that does not affect the standings of any major cup or competition.

   Because it was only an exhibition, neither side risked their injured players.

   The club scheduled an exhibition against a touring foreign team.

   Similarfriendly

   Note

   Sport borrowed the word for a game played to be watched rather than to settle anything. The result changes no league table and no cup standing. That is why "only an exhibition" is the natural way to say a result does not count, and why teams treat such games as a chance to rest players or meet opponents they would not otherwise face.

6. 6
   nounUKcountable

   A financial award or prize given to a student by a school or university, usually for academic merit.

   He was awarded an exhibition that covered most of his tuition.

   Two pupils from the grammar school gained exhibitions to Oxford on the strength of their entrance papers.

   Similarscholarship, bursary, award, grant

   Note

   British schools and universities use the word for money, not a show, and the student who holds one is an exhibitioner. Students win or gain an exhibition to a particular university, as in Jonathan Meades's line about someone who "gained an exhibition to Cambridge." Lawrence Durrell's Livia (1978) capitalizes it, "an Exhibition to Oxford," almost like a title. Keep it distinct from the public show.

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