Image: UMLAUF Sculpture Garden + Museum, Austin
The UMLAUF Sculpture Garden + Museum in Austin is marking its 35th anniversary with ‘35x35x35’, an exhibition of 35 works by Charles Umlauf borrowed from 35 private collections. It opened on 24 June 2026 and closes on 18 October 2026.
Many of the works are rarely on public view, and the museum presents the selection as a chance to see the breadth of Umlauf’s output across materials, styles and subject matter, tracing the evolution of a six-decade career rather than a single phase or theme.
Umlauf moved to Austin from Chicago in 1941 to teach sculpture and life drawing at the University of Texas. The museum describes his early work of the 1940s as carrying the emotional weight of a world at war, expressed through introspective human forms; by the 1950s the compositions had become more balanced and classical, at times allegorical; and in later decades he turned increasingly to movement, sensuality and the expressive potential of the figure.
The museum itself opened in 1991 after Charles Umlauf (1910–1994) and his wife Angeline Umlauf (1915–2012) gave land and artwork, and it now occupies a six-acre site in central Austin. Staff lead a walk-through of the exhibition every Friday at 11 a.m. with no RSVP required, and on Wednesday 7 October the curatorial team and lenders will discuss how the show came together in ‘Insights: 35x35x35’, with doors at 6 p.m. and the talk beginning at 6.30 p.m. The project is supported in part by an Elevate Grant from Austin Arts, Culture, Music and Entertainment.
