Biophilia

Biophilia is an extraordinary and innovative multimedia exploration of music, nature and technology by the musician Björk. Comprising a suite of original music and interactive, educational artworks and musical artifacts, Biophilia is released as ten in-app experiences that are accessed as you fly through a three-dimensional galaxy that accompanies the album’s theme song Cosmogony. All of the album’s songs are available inside Biophilia as interactive experiences: Crystalline, Virus, Moon, Thunderbolt, Sacrifice, Mutual Core, Hollow, Solstice, and Dark Matter.

Björk has collaborated with artists, designers, scientists, instrument makers, writers and software developers to create an extraordinary multimedia exploration of the universe and its physical forces, processes and structures – of which music is a part. Each in-app experience is inspired by and explores the relationships between musical structures and natural phenomena, from the atomic to the cosmic. You can use Biophilia to make and learn about music, to find out about natural phenomena, or to just enjoy Björk’s music.

Biophilia opens into a three-dimensional galaxy with a compass allowing navigation between the 3-dimensional universe and a two-dimensional track list. Take a closer look by tapping on stars within the constellations and you’ll see that each is a full app-within-an-app that gives access to the inspired combination of artifacts for each new Björk song: interactive art and games, music notation which can be used to sing along karaoke-style, abstract animations, lyrics, and essays that explore Björk’s inspirations for the track. These artifacts bring together conventional and alternative ways of representing and making music to create an environment for entertainment and learning. Biophilia challenges the way we think about music. Here, for the first time, is a music album that exploits the multimedia capabilities of mobile interactive technologies.

Biophilia was developed by Björk in collaboration with interactive artist and app developer Scott Snibbe, and Björk’s longtime design collaborators M/M Paris. The individual apps were created by Luc Barthelet, Drew Berry, Kodama Studios, Stephen Malinowski, Scott Snibbe Studio, John Simon Jr., Touch Press, and Max Weisel.

Features:

• Three-dimensional galactic interface with the song Cosmogony
• Nine fully interactive song apps
• Music scores with karaoke playback
• Abstract song animation
• Lyrics
• Essays