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At the same time, he executed a bas-relief for the Kristiania
Palace, «Carl Johan Laying the Foundation Stone of the Palace».
Towards the close of the seventies, he went to Koine, and there
executed his splendid »Barbarian Mother», a woman carrying her
dead son out of the battle (in marble in the Glyptotheca Ny-Carls-
berg in Copenhagen, and in the Sculptural Museum in Kristiania).
About 1883, the sculptor settled in Copenhagen, and there executed,
among other things, an equestrian frieze for Jacobsen’s Glyptotheca.
He then set to work upon his «Captive Mother», and soon
after applied himself to a larger composition: «Two Human
Beings», a fervent and expressive love-poem in bronze. In the
Glyptotheca Ny-Carlsberg, there is also an interesting sculpture in
wood the «Eldest of the Family» B a peculiar mixture of
conventional archaism in the drapery, and clear naturalism in
the naked portions. Finally, Sinding has executed statues of
Bjornson and Ibsen, and Laura Gundersen, the actress, for the
National Theatre in Kristiania. In Sinding’s works, there is a
breath of fresh energy and natural vigour, that give a sense of
freedom.
S k e i b r o k began in 1871 as a wood-carver, bnt soon aroused
well-merited attention by his busts of Michael Sars, Edvard Grieg,
and the Icelandic thinker,'Magnus Eirikson. In 1878, he exhibited
in Paris his «Ragnar Lodbrok in the Snake-pit», now in the
Sculptural Museum in Kristiania. He executed for the Kristiania
Palace «Oscar II Unveiling the Statue of Carl Johan». His
«Mother Waking», in the National Gallery, shows delicate feeling.
He then executed his «Snorre Sturlason», as a silver-wedding present
for the King and Queen: In Paris he executed «Tired», a
servant-maid, fallen asleep from weariness, a figure full of feeling
and truth. After having executed «An Outlaw», and a number
of busts, he received an order in 1886 for a group for the tympanum
on the façade of the centre building of the University —
«Athene endowing the Man that Prometheus has made with a
Soul» — a work in true classic spirit and style.
Among the contemporaries of Sinding and Skeibrok may
be mentioned S o r e n L e x o w - H a n s e n , whose effective «Vala» in
bronze is the property of the National Gallery; O s c a r C a s t b e r g ,
whose bust of Heltberg, principal of a renowned School in
Kristiania, is also in the same collection; J o h a n n a S i n d i n g , sister
of the sculptor, and C h r i s t i a n D a a e M a g e l s s e n .