Over the span of her nearly 40 year career, Björk has cultivated a solar system of visuals to tease out both the concrete and abstract concepts in her music. She has often created strikingly artful pieces of video, those pieces serving to illuminate the shadier corners of her mien. I say this with a very high regard for Björk as a musician and an artist—whatever her aims are (and they can be hard to discern)—she is a major contributor to the music video as a high art form. She can be playful or avant-garde in collaborative efforts of image.
10. Lionsong
"Lionsong," from her most recent album (2015's "Vulnicura"), is a meditation on the possibilities of a failing relationship. Björk is in a strange bodysuit, going back and forth over her predicament as if she's plucking petals from a wilting flower. She often employs this setup—she appears as a single figure, gesticulating with her hands in addition to the movement her suit allows. A heaving chest exacerbates the inhuman qualities of her suit, though by the end she is more vulnerable and human, not unlike the open wound of the past relationship she is singing about.
9. Mutual Core
Björk is the nucleus of a quicksand pool in which rocks fly up around her, the literal defining of a "core." The cores of the rocks are multi-colored layers that slowly grow into each other and subsequently stretch into human faces. The explosive nature of the music video matches the building organ in the song and glitched electronic beats. CGI is in full effect here, serving to blow open the deep caverns of the song even more.
The music video for "Human Behavior" put director Michel Gondry ("Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind") on the map and cemented Björk's quirkiness for her debut album in 1993. Cartoonish landscapes blossom around her as she traverses a forest with childlike wonder.
7. Isobel
Another Michel Gondry-directed piece, "Isobel" experiments with noir film, a nightmarish disorientation permeating its aura. As if irradiated by candlelight, Björk is lit underneath vestiges of a previous era. Model airplanes move above her while she fades in and out of the foreground. The creeping strings of the song devote the video to a sense of mystery.
In the video for "Venus As A Boy," Björk cooks an egg. And that's pretty much it. It's the act that makes her into a sort of nymph as she moves around a shadowed kitchen, delighting in sexuality from an unexpected place.
5. Pagan Poetry
One of Björk's more explicit music videos, "Pagan Poetry" finds meaning in topography that shifts and bends—the topography being her body as she sews through her skin. It's not as graphic as it sounds, though it does present vaguely erotic formations that trick the eye. Then she is windswept against a dark background, draped in beads and nearly lunatic. This is Björk at her most adeptly disturbed.
"Big Time Sensuality" is Björk's most recognizable look, mini buns atop her head and arms wildly motioning on the back of a flatbed truck. The truck takes her through a city, expressions of joy ghosting across her face. This is a pure image of happiness in her illustrious career, as much of her music is fraught with complicated tension and ambiguity.
Director Spike Jonze ("Her") helps Björk pull off a classic musical theatre move replete with dancers and bursts of energy. The song has a quiet and loud feel to it, with hushed singing and sudden horns. It's one of her most popular songs, and both her vocal and acted performance attests to that.
2. Hyperballad
In "Hyperballad," Björk sings about a relationship that works because every morning she goes to a cliff, exerting her anger by throwing objects off of it, so that she can simply be with that person. As if filmed in a womb, the visuals in this music video are amniotic, 8-bit animation mixing with Björk's dual faces -- one sleeping, the other engaged. It seems to perfectly fit the song's sonic life, even the flecked colors in alignment with its tone.
Here is Björk's magnum opus. So minimal that it's almost sterile, the video for "All is Full of Love" doesn't even feature Björk. Two robots (one eerily similar-looking to Björk) move closer together, floating in space and doomed to a mechanized existence. The shockingly beautiful moment and peak of the video is when they embrace in a kiss, taking on a human-like persona, one that aches towards validation and acceptance. With such a cold aesthetic, Björk can still reach the sublime, the universal, and the absolute.
