Photo: Patrick McMullen

I’ve been hearing rumblings of bad things since the show was announced. Criticizing a museum for celebrating a pop star, or making fun of the kooky lady that wore the swan dress to the Oscars is WAY too easy. So, I wanted to hear that this was a great show –or even just good. Nope. My problem isn’t necessarily with the subject matter but, I will say the performing arts compared to the visual arts hardly EVER gets ANY publicity, so by all means, let’s turn the museums and galleries over to them! (That was sarcastic sour grapes, in case you missed the subtlety.) And this post may be cheating a bit but since I’m not planning on seeing this show, I thought I’d just pick out few write-ups from some respected art sources, Flavorwire, Art News, and New York magazine’s Jerry Saltz and his wife New York Times critic, Roberta Smith. Draw your own conclusions but these are hardly raves…

Björk’s MoMA Retrospective: When Technology Fails Innovation
“The bulk of the exhibit — its ‘Songlines’ section — is a technological mess. Of course, one wouldn’t know this based on how MoMA and the exhibit’s sponsor, Volkswagen, spoke of “Songlines” yesterday during the museum’s press presentation for the Björk retrospective. The words ‘revolutionary’ and ‘groundbreaking’ were tossed around with regards to the exhibit’s use of technology. Those descriptors would be generous even if the tech aspect of ‘Songlines‘ functioned correctly, but alas. Frankly, it was surprising coming from an artist who went to great lengths to declare her own Biophilia the ‘first app album’ in 2011.” –Jillian Mapes, Flavorwire

Biesenbach’S Bjork Show Turns MoMA Into Planet Hollywood
“I felt sad and embarrassed leaving the museum. Embarrassed for Björk mostly, who deserved better than this, but also for MoMA. That the country’s preeminent modern art museum is putting pop culture on a pedestal as a means of driving attendance is no surprise–this has been going on for years and has produced a number of very popular exhibitions (Tim Burton, Kraftwerk, etc.). I won’t fault an institution for embracing the masses and I can’t even hold their flagrant product placement–Volkswagen is as much the subject of this show as Björk–against them. Keep your doors open by any means necessary, but at least have the decency to call it like it is. Black Lake isn’t a ‘new immersive music and film experience,’ it’s a music video. ‘Songlines’ isn’t an ‘experimental sound experience,’ it’s an audio tour. And the show is hardly a retrospective—it’s starfucking, something increasingly familiar at MoMA, and a failure even at that.” –M.H. Miller, ArtNews

MoMA’s Björk Disaster
“I wanted to be surprised and proven wrong about the Björk show. Alas, I haven’t been. Housed in the museum’s atrium in a two-story, black-painted wooden-pavilion thing, you wind through lines (very, very long lines), reading handwritten lyrics in books encased in vitrines, hearing snippets of music, and then donning a headset that leads you through a 40-minute tour of the second floor, album by album. It’s a discombobulated mess. The spoken narrative, written by Icelandic poet Sjón and read by actor Margrét Vilhjálmsdóttir, is a pretty silly fable about a “young girl” who ventures into “kingdoms.” As you walk, signals tell the headset that you’ve moved on, and it begins playing the next chapter of the tale. All the while, video clips play here and there, and we look into alcoves containing some of the fantastic costumes and paraphernalia used in some of the music videos, including those wooly yak-creatures. The halls, where you will spend the vast bulk of your time, are lined with pictures from the albums. There is one pillow-laden theater that screens Björk’s music videos. In another, a ten-minute work commissioned by MoMA is displayed. Unfortunately, this work is not yet up to museum or gallery standards. [Klaus] Biesenbach is no idiot, but the show is “sound and fury, signifying nothing.” Even, I venture, for fans.” –Jerry Saltz, New York magazine

Björk, a One-of-a-Kind Artist, Proves Elusive at MoMA
“Björk should have said no — not because her work isn’t museum-worthy but because, as proved here, the Modern is not up to the task. The show is billed as a “midcareer survey,” but its disappointing catalog indicates little of the research, documentation or context setting that such projects usually entail, and the exhibition hasn’t been allotted much more gallery space than one of the museum’s “projects series” showing work by emerging artists. Given the number of Björk fans it will probably attract, the show’s future as a logistical nightmare seems clear. It was already indicated at the preview on Tuesday night.

This undertaking does not treat Björk as the ‘era-defining artist’ that Mr. Biesenbach claims she is. Lacking the ambition to do her ambition justice, it might better have been staged in a more relaxed curatorial manner at MoMA PS1.” –Roberta Smith, The New York Times

(Photos, Instagram/Klaus Biesenbach)