Ella Dancy Dibrell
Ella Dancy Dibrell (1863-1920) was a prominent Texas clubwoman and one of the most influential people in preserving Elisabet Ney’s legacy in the state of Texas. Dibrell was born near La Grange and moved to Austin with her two daughters after a divorce from her first husband, Thomas Hall. In 1899, she married Joseph Dibrell, a lawyer and politician from Seguin, and the two had one son together. Ella Dibrell participated in and led several women’s organizations including a Seguin Shakespeare Club and the Daughters of the Republic of Texas (DRT). She later served as the president of the Texas Federation of Women’s Clubs. Dibrell became acquainted with Ney during her time as president of the DRT. She assisted the sculptor in establishing her portraits of Stephen F. Austin and Sam Houston in the State Capitol and became one of Ney’s closest friends and patrons.
Following Ney’s death in 1907, Dibrell purchased her Austin studio, Formosa, from Edmund Montgomery, with the intent of preserving the sculptor’s legacy. In 1911, she and a group of friends met at the site and established the influential Texas Fine Arts Association (TFAA) and the Elisabet Ney Museum. Ney’s studio served as a meeting space for the nascent organization and as a gallery space in which the group hosted biannual art shows. The Texas Fine Arts Association devoted itself to advocating for issues including the establishment of a Texas art school and the creation of a state arts commission. In addition to her role in the founding of the TFAA, Dibrell also had Ney’s masterpiece, Lady Macbeth, placed in the National Museum of American Art in Washington, D.C., where it remains today.
An inscription at the Elisabet Ney Museum reads:
"This tablet is effected by the Texas Fine Arts Association in honor of its founder Mrs. Ella Dancy Dibrell to perpetuate the memory of her service to art for the people of Texas and in grateful recognition of the generosity of her husband Judge Joseph Dibrell of Seguin and her daughter Mrs. Walter Nolte of San Antonio in giving this property to the Texas Fine Arts Association for the perpetual use of the people of Texas."