Sjón

Sigurjón Birgir Sigurðsson (born 27 August 1962), known as Sjón ( ; ; meaning "sight" and being an abbreviation of his first name), is an Icelandic poet, novelist, lyricist, and screenwriter. Sjón frequently collaborates with the singer Björk and has performed with the Sugarcubes as Johnny Triumph. His works have been translated into 30 languages.

Early life

Born in Reykjavík, Iceland, Sjón grew up in the city's Breiðholt district, where he lived with his mother. Later, he described David Bowie as being "like a tutor to me" because he would explore all the bands, authors, and artists that Bowie mentioned in interviews.

Active on the Icelandic music scene since the early 1980s, Sjón has collaborated with many of the best-known artists of the era and was featured as guest vocalist on a rare Sugarcubes 12" single "Luftgitar" in 1987 using the name Johnny Triumph; this was accompanied by a music video of Sjón playing air guitar with Björk and Einar Örn Benediktsson. Sjón would occasionally reprise this role for the final encore of the Sugarcubes concerts, including the band's one-off 2006 reunion show in Reykjavík.

Sjón has described rowdy and exuberant events from his youthful era, including a night spent walking around Reykjavik entirely on the roofs of parked cars that ended with him lying face down in a police car reciting from memory André Breton's Surrealist Manifesto of 1924. Later, when Björk began her solo career in the 1990s, Sjón wrote lyrics for her.

Writing In 2007, he contributed the original story and wrote the screenplay for the animated film Anna and the Moods. He also joined the cast, voicing the character Dr. Artmann.

Sjón co-wrote the feature Lamb together with Valdimar Jóhannsson. Lamb premiered in 2021 and was selected as Iceland's contribution to the 2022 Academy Awards. Lamb also received a lot of international recognition through festivals around the world. It has been nominated for or received prizes at the Cannes Film Festival, Gothenburg Film Festival, Sitges Film Festival, Palm Springs International Film Festival, and Athens International Film Festival, as well as from the Edda Awards and the Austin Film Critics Association Awards.

From August to December 2021, Sjón was writer-in-residence at the Literaturhaus Zurich and the PWG Foundation in Zurich.

Sjón co-wrote the 2022 film The Northman, a historical epic and revenge thriller based on the legend of the Viking prince Amleth, with director Robert Eggers. Björk appears in the film in a supporting role as a seeress.

His writing is characterized by surrealist elements, like unexpected transformations, strange events, and a blurring of boundaries between humans and other animals. Hanging on the wall inside are the rib and shoulder blade of a large whale that once beached and died a short walk away from the cottage. "If you're here," Sjón says of his writing cottage, "then you're in the belly of the whale."

He has been outspoken against the co-option of traditional Nordic culture and literature by right-wing and nationalist political actors.

In 2016, Sjón became the third writer chosen to contribute to the Future Library project.