Tropicália: The Brazilian Movement That Ate the World

The Tropicália movement, also known as tropicalismo, emerged from the 1967 Festival de Música Popular Brasileira in Rio de Janeiro, where Caetano Veloso performed 'Alegria Alegria' and Gilberto Gil sang 'Domingo no parque' on October 21. The term 'Tropicália' was coined from an installation by Hélio Oiticica, who, along with Lygia Clark, Rogério Duprat, and Antonio Dias, brought the movement into visual arts. Influenced by concrete poetry (Augusto de Campos, Haroldo de Campos, Décio Pignatari) and Oswald de Andrade's 1928 'Manifesto Antropófago', Tropicália embraced cultural cannibalism, blending bossa nova, rock'n'roll, folk, African music, experimental music, and fado. Though short-lived due to bossa nova's popularity, the movement was revived after 1985, coinciding with Brazil's return to democracy and its 25th anniversary. Veloso and Gil produced 'Tropicália 2', and Veloso later wrote that Tropicália gave rock'n'roll respectability while allowing a view of Brazil as simultaneously a super-international Rio, an archaic pre-Bahia, and a futuristic post-Brasília. The movement's musical manifesto was the 1968 album 'Tropicália ou Panis et circensis' by Veloso, Gil, Gal Costa, Nara Leão, Rogério Duprat, Torquato Neto, and Os Mutantes.