He writes poetry, novels and screenplays and also poetry, working for example for Björk, with whom he has co-authored the opening song for the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens. The artistic roots of the author lie in surrealism, punk and performance art. His texts for Lars von Trier‘s film Dancer in the Dark were nominated for an Oscar. For his novel The Blue Fox (Schattenfuchs, S. Fischer 2007), Sjón's first publication in German language, he received the Literature Prize of the Nordic Council in 2005. Most recently his novel From the Mouth of the Whale (Das Gleißen der Nacht, 2011) was published in German.