American sculptor Gortzon Borglum trained in Paris at the Academie Julian and the Ecole des Beaux-Artes. By the age of 30, he was gaining fame for both his paintings and sculptures in Europe.

 

In the early 1900s, Borglum established a studio in New York City where his bronzes were added to the collection at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and be began accepting commissions for bronze busts and statues from churches, government agencies, and corporations. Most notable was Borglum's large marble bust of President Abraham Lincoln for the Rotunda of the Capitol in Washington, D.C.

 

The sculptor achieved fame for his large-scale sculptures of Confederate leaders on Stone Mountain, Georgia in 1924.

 

Borglum later was 

commissioned to immortalize four American Presidents (Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt) on Mount Rushmore in South Dakota.