About the Texas Fine Arts Association

Elisabet Ney set a goal quite early during her time living in Central Texas of creating an art association for the state.

Initially, the organization was called the Academy of Liberal Arts, with Ney serving as the academy’s president. She travelled throughout the state and presented lectures on subjects such as “The Mission of Art.”

After Elisabet Ney’s passing, her close friends and colleagues Julia Pease, Bride Neill Taylor, Emma Richardson Cherry, Emma Kyle Burleson, Anna Pennybacker, Ella Peyton, Ella Dancy Dibrell, Johanna Runge, Oline Sayers, Mary Mitchell, and Anita Miller founded the Texas Fine Arts Association (TFAA) on April 6, 1911, at Ney’s long time residence and studio: Formosa.

Ella Dancy Dibrell, a particularly close friend of Elisabet Ney, bought Formosa and its surrounding property in 1908 from Edmund Montgomery with the desire to preserve the home/studio and the art within its walls.

This building is our present-day Elisabet Ney Museum, and now the Texas Fine Arts Association is recognized as the first organization to promote the pursuit of art-making within the state of Texas.

The association later agreed to grant the rights of ownership to Ney’s sculptures to the University of Texas at Austin so long as the sculptures remained within the walls of the Formosa studio. Traveling arts programs, as well as semi-annual exhibitions, were established by the Texas Fine Arts Association, and they became extremely popular among the general public as the years passed. The TFAA eventually went on to include such properties as Laguna Gloria, a property previously owned by Clara Driscoll.

The long and successful history of the TFAA would not have been achievable, however, without Elisabet Ney’s initial support for an organization such as this.

Pamphlet for The Texas Fine Arts Association and Elisabet Ney Museum

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