Focus on this artwork and explain the History.
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.: 86–87  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.: 143 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.: 141–142  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.: 93  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.
statue Texas National Statuary Hall Collection Stephen F. Austin World's Columbian Exposition National Statuary Hall marble Texas State Capitol Austin, Texas Austin Oran Milo Roberts United States Capitol plaster Sam Houston Elisabet Ney