At 41, Halvor Skiftun Digernes has held many roles: barman, cocktail champion, coffee shop co-founder and, most recently, ceramic artist. His experiences are now converging in a series of ceramic art collaborations with Norwegian and Japanese artists and businesses.
The Norwegian artist, who previously spent time in Japan to open and run the cafe Fuglen near Yoyogi Park, will return from Oslo to host an event on Oct. 14 at Tokyo brewery Ol (which is pronounced like “pool” without the “p”). There, he will debut handcrafted ceramic beer tap handles made from nepheline syenite sourced from the north of Norway, earthenware from the streets of Oslo, sheep’s head bone ash from the west coast and barley ash from Ol’s own beer production, with Japanese metal coupling to fix it all in place.
At the event, Digernes will also step behind the bar to mix cocktails with Norwegian beer, Japanese sake from brewer Terada Honke (another collaborator) and seasonal Japanese mikan (mandarin oranges). As if that wasn’t enough, later in the night he’ll play a DJ set under his alter ego, DJ Kiln’it, with Norwegian records he’s collected over the years.