Icelandic singer Bjork, who recently released the first single from her new album Utopia, has joined women worldwide who are calling out sexism within the film industry – following the revelation that Harvey Weinstein is sexual predator.
In a Facebook post, Bjork spoke up about a Danish film director whose sexual advances she “turned down” and who then “sulked and punished” her.
She wrote: “it was extremely clear to me when i walked into the actresses profession that my humiliation and role as a lesser sexually harassed being was the norm and set in stone with the director and a staff of dozens who enabled it and encouraged it”.
She went on to write that it was only later she realised that it was a “universal thing” in the industry, and that she was able to get away with her actions and recover because she had “no ambitions in the acting world”.
Bjork has had a complicated relationship with feminism but in recent years has been more active in speaking up for women's rights.
Last year she told Iceland magazine: “My mother was a very active feminist and she raised me thinking that we had complained enough, and it was time to start doing things. So, I went out and did things. Made sure that I wasn't complaining. But, then I realised that the younger generations maybe don't have the same experience as I did… I felt that I had to support them by saying that they were not alone... That this was hard, and that's true.”
She ended her Facebook post by saying that she thought the unnamed Danish director “had a more fair and meaningful relationship with his actresses after my confrontation so there is hope”.
Read her full statement below:
