Exhibition features more than 40 objects—including paintings, furniture, textiles, photography, and ceramics—highlighted by three paintings and a large-scale drawing by Egon Schiele

July 21, 2025

Minneapolis—The Minneapolis Institute of Art (Mia) announces the opening of “Timber! Art and Woodwork at the Fall of the Austro-Hungarian Empire,” on view August 30, 2025, through January 11, 2026. This exhibition uncovers the role of wood as a natural resource and artistic medium in the waning years of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

At the heart of the exhibition is Egon Schiele’s haunting and rarely seen 1913 masterpiece, The Sawmill, on loan from a private foundation. A mill located on the imperial periphery is surrounded by piles of freshly cut timber, but itself seems to be in a process of collapse. The mill can be read as a symbol of the empire, which in 1913 was in a precarious state as its provinces demanded autonomy.

The exhibition represents two outcomes for the sawmill’s timber: a wooden bridge in another painting by Schiele (also from a private foundation), and avant-garde wooden furniture, including works by Schiele’s friend and mentor, the designer Josef Hoffmann. In a new ecocritical reading of the painting, the exhibition presents Schiele uncovering the destructive and chaotic origins out of which the purity and abstraction of Hoffmann’s work emerges.

Bringing together Schiele’s evocative landscapes, canonical modernist design, early photography, and decorative arts, “Timber!” envelops visitors in a darkly opulent, materially conscious environment. The exhibition pairs the rawness of timber extraction with the refinement of Viennese design, featuring significant works by Gebrüder Thonet, whose technical innovations in bentwood furniture redefined design across Europe.  In 21st-century design, wood is again taking a central place for its carbon-retaining properties in products such as cross-laminated timber. Thonet’s innovations, adopted by Hoffmann, arguably represent the last time that the technical properties of wood were being pushed to their limit by a design avant-garde.

“The Sawmill is a painting that speaks to our contemporary concerns with resource extraction, imperial collapse, and peripheral labor,” said Max Bryant, the James Ford Bell Associate Curator of European Decorative Arts and Sculpture at Mia. “It invites visitors to consider how something as beautiful and refined as a Hoffmann chair might trace its origin to a deforested hillside or dilapidated sawmill.”

Visitors will step into a world of forest-dark hues, carved wood, and texture—an atmosphere designed to encourage slow looking, deep thinking, and a tactile appreciation of historical design. At the end of each day, a movement from Mahler’s Third Symphony, from the recent recording by the Minnesota Orchestra, will play in the gallery.

A highlight for music lovers and aesthetes alike, the exhibition resonates with the era’s musical and cultural richness—from Strauss’s lush waltzes to the avant-garde compositions of Gustav Mahler and the Second Viennese School. It also offers compelling insights for those interested in environmental history and extractivism in the modern world.

Featuring more than 40 objects, including paintings, furniture, textiles, photography, and ceramics, “Timber!” invites audiences to look, read, and luxuriate while reflecting on the materials and ideologies that shaped both a visual culture and a disappearing empire.

Exhibition Details

• Exhibition Title: “Timber! Art and Woodwork at the Fall of the Austro-Hungarian Empire”
• Dates: August 30, 2025–January 11, 2026
• Location: Cargill Gallery, Mia
• Cost: Free

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About the Minneapolis Institute of Art

Home to more than 100,000 works of art representing 5,000 years of world history, the Minneapolis Institute of Art (Mia) inspires wonder, spurs creativity, and nourishes the imagination. With extraordinary exhibitions and one of the finest art collections in the country—from all corners of the globe, from ancient to contemporary—Mia links the past to the present, enables global conversations, and offers an exceptional setting for inspiration. Learn more about Mia in our latest Impact Report.

General admission to Mia is always free, but some special exhibitions charge a nominal fee.

For more information, call + 1 612 870 3000 or visit www.artsmia.org. Everyone is welcome. Always.