his own land, however, was too harsh for his delicate and
soulful nature, and his talent never reached its full measure
of vigor and luxuriance.

Another among them, Sinding, an active and fearless
spirit, has bravely attacked the most difficult problems and in
supple sympathy with contemporaneous French sculpture has
executed a series of works which have borne the master's
fame far beyond the confines of his native country. His
artistic individuality, nevertheless, is not of those that are
bound to their own soil; impatient over all the tribulations
which a Norwegian sculptor must contend with, he has chosen
Denmark as his second home.

The only one of the number who has given substance to an
art that with unfailing power reflects a deep and vehemently
marked personality still stands beneath an ascendent star.
And his achievements are already numerous enough and
weighty enough to give an impression of the profound
philosophy of life expressed through his art. This man is
Vigeland. For the rest we meet but few whose endowments
have attained such a height or developed so distinctive a qual-
ity that they deserve to be named unusual. Most of them
bear the scars of the overpowering conditions under which
they have labored. At an earlier or later period their artistic
strength has been crippled.

It was not merely that with the larger number the natural
craving for encouragement and for favoring fortune was
altogether too infrequently satisfied. Even that mutual
sympathy of artist for artist, which from time to time has
served to unite our painters and to hearten them in seasons
of trial, is not discoverable among the scattered and isolated
figures in the small company of our embattled sculptors.
The battle they have waged has been, in almost every single
case, not only a depressing battle on behalf of art, but too
often also a bitter struggle for bread. Hardly one of them
has escaped the occasional lack of the bare necessaries of
existence.

On the other hand, it is just their calm courage and their
fidelity to a once accepted calling that lend significance to

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