| Statue of Stephen F. Austin | |
| Italic Title: | no |
| Image Upright: | 1 |
| Artist: | Elisabet Ney |
| Medium: | Marble sculpture |
| Subject: | Stephen F. Austin |
| Height Imperial: | 76.5 |
| Dimensions Ref: | [1] |
| Metric Unit: | cm |
| Imperial Unit: | in |
| Museum: | National Statuary Hall Collection |
| City: | Washington, D.C., United States |
Stephen F. Austin is a statue of Stephen F. Austin by Elisabet Ney, originally modeled in 1893 and installed in 1905; it is part of the National Statuary Hall Collection in the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C., as one of the two statues from Texas. The other Texas statue, Sam Houston, is also by Ney and was produced in parallel. Another carving of Stephen F. Austin is displayed in the Texas State Capitol, where it was installed in 1903.[2]
In early 1892, the Texas government was preparing materials for a building at the World's Columbian Exposition to be held the following year in Chicago. Texas Governor Oran Milo Roberts recommended that the women's commission charged with fundraising for the exhibit speak with Elisabet Ney, a German–American sculptor residing in Austin, Texas. After a meeting, Ney was invited to sculpt portrait statues of Sam Houston and Stephen F. Austin for the exhibit, though the commission had no funds to pay the artist for her work.[3] Ney agreed and went to work first on the statue of Houston; she began work on Austin's statue in early 1893 and completed a plaster rendering of Austin by that fall.[1]
The statue of Austin was completed too late to be displayed in Chicago, but Ney and the women's commission intended to cut editions of the Houston and Austin statues in marble for permanent display in the Texas State Capitol.[1] It took years to secure the necessary funding, but in 1901 the Texas Legislature appropriated the funds for the carving, and the two statues were unveiled in the Texas Capitol on January 19, 1903.[4] [3] An additional copy of each statue was cut for submission to the National Statuary Hall Collection and unveiled in the United States Capitol in 1905.[5]
Stephen F. Austin is a full-length statue in marble. It shows Austin standing on slightly uneven ground with his left foot forward, looking up and ahead into the distance. The lowered hands hold a partially unrolled scroll, meant to represent a map, while a Kentucky long rifle leans against the left hip and leg. Austin is portrayed as a young explorer dressed in fringed buckskins. The front face of the self base (the marble platform on which the figure stands) is inscribed "".
Ney used authentic period objects for reference in developing the details of the sculpture, including the long rifle and scroll map. When critics complained that the Houston statue was 6inchesft2inchesin (ftin) tall while the Austin statue was only 5inchesft7inchesin (ftin), she replied that these had been the actual heights of the men, and that anyone objecting should "take the issue up not with her but with God."[1]