KAL!
Kalcifer Norton is a potter currently located in western Wisconsin who creates utilitarian forms emulating the surfaces of weathered buildings and rusted metal. They achieve this through the use of surface texture and slips. The imagery Kal likes to focus on consists of roadside structures they have been surrounded by throughout their life as a metaphor for fading memories, loneliness, and desolation.
“In many religions, cultures, and folklore beliefs, life was created through clay.”
My pots are self-portraits based on my own experiences growing up in Southeastern Minnesota. These portraits feature imagery of midwestern farm buildings, focusing mainly on silos and barns. I am also interested in fencing, telephone wires, birds, and laundry posts.
Part of why I love making is the physicality of it: wedging the clay, pinching coils, tossing sodium into the kiln. There is a rhythm to the way I work, a sort of ebb and flow, rocking from one step to the next. I feel as if I’m dancing, the way I sway from one task to another during the creation of my work.
Barbed Wire Vase, Soda Fired Stoneware, 2022
Carbon Goblet, Soda and Salt Fired Stoneware, 2021-22
Faceless Barn Dish, Soda Fired Stoneware, 2022
I Can Feel a Storm Coming, Soda Fired Stoneware, 2022
Teapot with Power Line Decoration, Soda Fired Stoneware, 2022
Bird Spoon Rest, Soda Fired Stoneware, 2022
Bird Dish, Salt and Soda Fired Stoneware, 2021-22
Birds on a Telephone Wire Bowl, Soda Fired Stoneware, 2022
Rusted Memories of a Long Drive, Soda Fired Stoneware, 2022
Farm Medallion Plate, Soda Fired Stoneware, 2022
I’m an internet star!
Check out this student spotlight demonstration I did for the UWRF Ceramics YouTube page! I talk a bit about my process and the content of my work!
