Background

Björk Guðmundsdóttir was born on November 21, 1965, in the Icelandic capital city of Reykjavik, the daughter of Gudmundur Gunnarsson (an electrician) and Hildur Hauksdóttir who divorced before her second birthday, Björk grew up in a hippie-type community with her mother and her seven siblings. She started to study classical music at the age of 5 and released her first album in 1977 (mainly traditional Icelandic folk songs and international hits translated to Icelandic) when she was only 11.

Education

Musically gifted as a child, from the age of six to fourteen Björk attended Reykjavík music college, Barnamúsíkskóli, studying the classics and learning to play the piano and flute. It was here that Björk had her first taste of a professional career as a musician.

At one of the school’s recitals, Björk was recorded singing by her teacher. Luckily, this teacher then sent in the tape to the leading radio station in Iceland. So, the recording of Björk singing was nationally broadcasted. Eventually, she landed a recording contract which led to her self-titled début album Björk. The album was recorded when she was 11 but released in December 1977. Björk contained famous Icelandic children songs sung by Björk.

From lighthearted children’s music, the ever so cool 14-year-old Björk formed an all-girl punk band, called (in English) Spit and Snot. And, the following year she would not only start a new band, this time a Jazz fusion group called Exodus but also graduate from music school.

In 1982, Björk and bassist Jakob Magnússon formed the group Tappi Tíkarrass. The group was later featured in the documentary Rock in Reykjavík where a famous photo of Björk in a yellow dress was used for the cover.

Career

Björk's musical tastes were changed by the punk revolution of the late '70s; in 1979, she formed a post-punk group called Exodus and, in the following year, she sang in Jam 80. In 1981, Björk and Exodus bassist Jakob Magnusson formed Tappi Tikarrass, which released an EP, Bitid Fast I Vitid, on Spor later that year; it was followed by the full-length Miranda in 1983. Following Tappi Tikarrass, she formed the goth-tinged post-punk group KUKL with Einar Orn Benediktsson. KUKL released two albums, The Eye (1984) and Holidays in Europe (1986), on Crass Records before the band metamorphosed into the Sugarcubes in the summer of 1986.

The Sugarcubes became one of the rare Icelandic bands to break out of their native country when their debut album, Life's Too Good, became a British and American hit in 1988. For the next four years, the group maintained a successful cult following in the United Kingdom and the United States while they were stars within Iceland. During 1990, Björk recorded a set of jazz standards and originals with an Icelandic bebop group called Trio Gudmundar Ingolfssonar. The album, Gling-Gló, was released only in Iceland. By 1992, tensions between Björk and Einar had grown substantially, which resulted in the band splitting apart.

Following the breakup of the group, Björk moved to London, where she began pursuing a dance-oriented solo career. The previous year, she had sung on 808 State's "Ooops," which sparked her interest in club and house music. Björk struck up a working relationship with Nellee Hooper, a producer who had formerly worked with Soul II Soul and Massive Attack. The first result of their partnership was "Human Behaviour," which was released in June of 1993. "Human Behaviour" became a Top 40 hit in the United Kingdom, setting the stage for the surprising number three debut of the full-length album, Debut. Throughout 1993, Björk had hit the United Kingdom. singles - including "Venus as a Boy," "Big Time Sensuality," and the non-LP "Play Dead," a collaboration with David Arnold taken from the film Young Americans - as well as modern rock radio hits in the United States, and in both countries, she earned rave reviews. At the end of the year, NME magazine named Debut the album of the year, while she won International Female Solo Artist and Newcomer at the BRIT Awards; Debut went gold in the United States and platinum in the United Kingdom.

During 1994, Björk was relatively quiet as she recorded her second album with Nellee Hooper, Tricky, 808 State's Graham Massey, and Howie B of Mo' Wax Records; she also released a remix EP, co-wrote Madonna's "Bedtime Stories," and performed on MTV Unplugged that same year. "Army of Me," the first single from Björk's forthcoming album, was released as a teaser single in the spring of 1995; it debuted at number ten in the United Kingdom and became a moderate alternative rock hit in the United States Post, her second album, was released in June of 1995 to positive reviews; it peaked at number two in the United Kingdom and number 32 in the United States Post matched its predecessor in terms of sales and praise, going gold in the United States and helping her earn her second BRIT Award for Best International Female Artist. Post yielded the British hit singles "Isobel" (number 23), "It's Oh So Quiet" (number four), and "Hyperballad" (number eight), yet her singles failed to make much headway on American radio or MTV. Late in 1996, Björk released Telegram, an album comprising radical remixes of the entire Post album, in the United Kingdom; Telegram was released in America in January 1997.

Homogenic, her most experimental studio effort to date, followed later that same year and spawned many remix releases in the next few years to follow. In the spring of 2000, she was named Best Actress by jurors at the Cannes Film Festival for her work in Lars Von Trier's Palme d'Or-winning Dancer in the Dark. Selmasongs, her score for the film, reunited Björk with her Homogenic collaborator Mark Bell and arrived in the fall of 2000, just in time for Dancer in the Dark's United States release. The full-length follow-up, Vespertine, was released one year later. She released a Greatest Hits collection and the Family Tree box set late in 2002. After performing a few dates in 2003, Björk geared up for a busy 2004, which included the release of her all-vocals and vocal samples-based album Medúlla and a performance of one of its songs, "Oceania," at the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens, Greece.

The soundtrack to Drawing Restraint 9, a film by multimedia artist Matthew Barney, arrived in 2005 and also featured contributions from Will Oldham. Released in 2007, Volta returned to the more playful, percussive side of Björk's music and included collaborations with Timbaland, Toumani Diabaté, Antony Hegarty, and an all-female Icelandic choir. Her tour supporting the album was a lavish affair, as chronicled in the 2009 set Voltaic, which was released in sets ranging from a CD/DVD to limited multi-disc and vinyl editions.

While she was touring the world in support of Volta, Björk began work on her most ambitious project to date: Biophilia, an interactive exploration of humanity's relationships to sound and the universe that would also educate listeners/viewers about music theory and science. Initially envisioned as a musical house, then an IMAX film directed by Michel Gondry, Biophilia - which took shape with the help of engineers, scientists, and video game designers - was eventually released as a suite of apps for the iPad and iPhone. The album, which was also released on CD, arrived in October 2011. Bastards, a collection of Biophilia remixes, was released in Europe in late 2012 and in the United States in early 2013. Around that time, Björk launched a Kickstarter campaign to fund translating the Biophilia app for Android and Windows 8 platforms. Though the campaign was canceled after ten days, the app was translated to Android in July 2013. That month, she also appeared in When Björk Met Attenborough, a BBC Channel 4 documentary with Sir David Attenborough and scientist Oliver Sacks that related Biophilia to humanity's relationship with music.

In 2014, Björk contributed vocals to Death Grips' album Niggas on the Moon. She also continued the Biophilia project with a live concert film, Biophilia Live. Filmed at London's Alexandra Palace and featuring spectacular visuals, it was released theatrically and in DVD and Blu-ray sets that also included the live audio on CD. Late that year, it was announced that producers Arca and the Haxan Cloak collaborated on her upcoming album. Vulnicura, which traced the aftermath of Björk's relationship with Matthew Barney and harked back to the sounds of Vespertine and Homogenic, arrived in January 2015 after it was leaked ahead of its scheduled March release date. An acoustic version of the album, Vulnicura Strings, arrived at the end of 2015 and featured the viola organista, a keyboard-driven string instrument designed by Leonardo da Vinci. That year, Vulnicura Live, which featured Björk's favorite performances of the album's songs as well as some chosen from her other albums, was given a limited release; wider distribution followed in 2016. The following year, Björk once again teamed up with Arca for a follow-up to Vulnicura. The lighter but still complex Utopia, which featured Icelandic and Venezuelan birdsong, an all-female flute section, and lyrics inspired by science fiction and folklore, arrived in late 2017.

Achievements

• Björk has received four awards from both the BRIT Awards, from eight nominations, and the Music Television Video Music Awards, from twelve nominations. Björk has also received 12 nominations from the Grammy Awards but has not received an award; she was nominated every year from 1996 to 2002. The film industry has also recognized Björk by nominating the 2000 song, "I've Seen It All," for Best Original Song in a Motion Picture at the Academy Awards. She was ranked #36 on VH1's "The 100 Greatest Women in Rock and Roll." Overall, Björk has received fourteen awards from 52 nominations.
  
  

Works

More photos

• book

  • Bjork: 34 Scores for Piano/Organ/Harpsichord & Celeste

    (34 Scores for Piano, Organ, Harpsichord, and Celeste is t...)

    2017

• movie

  • Dancer in the Dark

    (Bjork stars in Lars von Trier's powerful film about a you...)

    2000
  • The Juniper Tree

    (This stark black-and-white drama explores the vast territ...)

    1990

• music

  • Debut 1993
  • Post 1995
  • Homogenic 1997
  • Vespertine 2001
  • Medulla 2004
  • Volta 2007
  • Biophilia 2011
  • Vulnicura 2015
  • Utopia 2017

Religion

When Bjork was asked if she believes in God, she replied, "I do not believe in religion, but if I had to choose one, it would be Buddhism." Earlier she told the Irish magazine Hot Press, "If I get into trouble, there’s no God or Allah to sort me out. I have to do it myself."

She also said: "I was sure that I was an atheist, but as I matured I realized nature is my religion."

Politics

She is an overtly political figure, she is strongly supportive of numerous liberation movements across the globe, including support for independence for Kosovo.

Views

Eclectic, iconoclastic, idiosyncratic, and melodic are useful adjectives when describing the Icelandic singer and songwriter Björk, one of the most unusual singers to emerge during the 1990s. She has managed to keep critics and fans guessing with each new and increasingly adventurous release since her split in 1992 from the Icelandic punk-pop band she fronted, the Sugarcubes. Björk's albums have sold several million copies, but it is difficult to pigeonhole her as an artist; her music incorporates elements of rock, pop, electronica, and dance. With her kewpie-doll looks, a multioctave voice that can be at once girlish and arresting, and unpredictable sense of style, Björk's avant-garde appeal has resulted in platinum-sales success and a loyal following among college students and adults.

She is strongly interested in environmental problems and charity.

Quotations: "If I had 500 years, I could collaborate with a lot of people. But I think another side of me is really, really loyal and really precious about collaboration. I don't think you should even go into it unless you think it's the absolute right thing to do and that you have equal things to give each other."

Personality

Some of Bjork's favorite movies include Tampopo (1985), An Angel at My Table (1990), Sweetie (1989), and Die Blechtrommel (1979).

Her favorite housework around the house is washing clothes because that's when a tune usually comes into her head.

Bjork was troubled by a stalker back in 1996 who tried to kill her by sending her an acid-spraying letter bomb and later killed himself. She never opened the letter as it was confiscated by the Metropolitan Police.

The New Zealand Herald lodged a complaint against Bjork for trying to assault a photographer by tearing his shirt and pushing him on the ground.

Interests

• nature, movies

• Writers

  George Bataille "Story Of The Eye," "The Diary of Anaïs Nin," Crispin Best

• Artists

  Samantha Shay, Káryyn, Claire Hentschker, Harry Evans, Jordan Wolfson

• Music & Bands

  PJ Harvey, Serpentwithfeet, Samaris

Connections

Following her short-lived marriage to Thór Eldon, Björk was romantically involved with several other members of the music industry, including U.K. artists Goldie and Tricky (of Massive Attack). Then, in 2000, she met Matthew Barney - the artist responsible for the Cremaster project - in New York while promoting Dancer in the Dark. The two soon began dating and remain together today. The couple had a child, daughter Isadora Bjarkardottir Barney, on October 3, 2002, and later worked together on the film Drawing Restraint 9 (2005). They reside in New York City.

Father:

Guðmundur Gunnarsson

Mother:

Hildur Rúna Hauksdóttir

Ex-husband:

Thór Eldon

husband:

Matthew Barney

Son:

Sindri Eldon Thórsson

Daughter:

Ísadóra Bjarkardóttir Barney

colleague:

Arca

colleague:

Mark Bell

colleague:

Tricky (Adrian Thaws)

colleague:

PJ Harvey

colleague:

Thom Yorke

References

• Björk - Facebook
• Bjork - YouTube
• Björk - Instagram
• Björk - Twitter
• Björk Björk is a contemporary icon whose contributions to music, video, film, fashion, and art have influenced a generation worldwide. Designed by top graphic design agency M/M as a slipcased world of wonders, this publication - which accompanies The Museum of Modern Art's spring 2015 exhibition on Björk - is composed of six parts: four booklets, a paperback and a poster.
  2015