Elisabet Ney Museum

The Museum is the former studio and portrait collection created by nineteenth-century sculptor Elisabet Ney. Venerated as one of the oldest museums in Texas, the Elisabet Ney Museum offers visitors a lovingly preserved glimpse into early Texas history and into the life of a creative and spirited woman who lived life passionately in her own inimitable way. Elisabet Ney was one of the most colorful and influential women in early Texas history. She and her husband Dr. Edmund Montgomery played an active role in the establishment of Texas state universities and the Texas Fine Arts Association, and they continue to this day to be an inspiration to people who love art and ideas. In 1892, celebrated European sculptress Elisabet Ney built a small neoclassical studio in the remote natural setting of Hyde Park, Austin, Texas. In this studio Ney sculpted the “great menâ€? of frontier Texas, among them life-size figures of Stephen F. Austin and Sam HoustonKaulbach that stand today in the national and state capitols. Ney also assembled in this studio her earlier sculptures of European notables, among them: King Ludwig II of Bavaria, King George V of Hanover, Otto von Bismarck, Giuseppe Garibaldi, Arthur Schopenhauer, and Jacob Grimm, all cherished portraits Ney rendered from life as a young artist. By the turn of the century, Elisabet Ney’s Hyde Park studio had become a gathering place for influential Texans drawn to the colorful character of “Miss Neyâ€? and to the stimulating discussions of politics, art and philosophy that took place there. Inspired by Ney’s “revolutionaryâ€? idea that art and beauty have been–and can be–powerful forces in the shaping of a nation as well as in individuals, these early Texans went on to found the University of Texas Art Department, the Texas Commission on the Arts, the Texas Fine Arts Association and museums and art schools throughout the state. Following Elisabet Ney’s death in 1907, her friends preserved the studio and its contents as the Elisabet Ney Museum, dedicated to honoring the memory of Elisabet Ney and to promoting her ideals and visions for the people of Texas. The Elisabet Ney Museum continues in this tradition today. People from every state in the nation and from throughout the world visit the Museum each year, learning of Elisabet Ney and early Texas history. As a national, state and local historic landmark, thousands of schoolchildren visit the Museum annually as part of their curricular studies.