Björk Was Hesitant About Her Upcoming MoMA Show

Björk Via: evolver.fm

If it seems like every day there’s new news about Björk, from her upcoming MoMA show (see Björk Gets MoMA Retrospective) to her New York concert series (see Björk to Play Six “Intimate” NYC Shows This Spring) to her hotly anticipated album (see Björk Will Release New Album Timed with MoMA Retrospective), it’s because Björkmania has officially hit. This time, she’s on the cover of T Magazine’s women’s fashion issue, and in her in-depth interview with Emily Witt, the quirky singer reveals some new details about both the exhibition and herself.

Wearing headphones, visitors will walk through what Witt describes as “an auditory hallucination of Björk’s career, which culminates in a new immersive environment—in Björk’s language, “a song.”” The song in question is “Black Lake,” a ten-minute ballad from her new album, which many speculate is about her former boyfriend, artist Matthew Barney, who is also the father of her twelve-year-old daughter. “It’s about the end of a relationship,” she admits. “Probably that’s the best way to put it…I have to deal with it—the black lake in me, because when a relationship falls apart, you have to.”

She also admits that initially, she was hesitant about the prospect of a museum show. After all, figuring out how to present sound art in a museum space isn’t exactly obvious, and she often worries that the visual elements she brings into her work might overshadow the music itself. “It wasn’t so much that I was really ambitious to do the best visuals in the world,” she says. “It was more that I burnt myself spending a lot of time doing the music and then seeing visuals accompanying them that just didn’t fit that music at all.”

Klaus Biesenbach, for his part, has no concerns about the show. “The exhibition is not about Björk’s art, it is Björk’s art, ” he said. “An attempt to transform forever how a musician’s work might be presented in the context of a museum.”


Follow Artnet News on Facebook:


Want to stay ahead of the art world? Subscribe to our newsletter to get the breaking news, eye-opening interviews, and incisive critical takes that drive the conversation forward.
Article topics