Tropicália (1967) - the installation that inspired the movement.

Graham Spicer headed to the Barbican Gallery to see the first major exhibition dedicated to Tropicália – the revolutionary Brazilian art and social movement of the late 1960s and early 1970s.

The late 1960s was a period of social and political repression in Brazil, with the country under an authoritarian military dictatorship. Economic development led to an influx of rural poor streaming into the cities, creating favelas, or shantytowns.

It was against this backdrop that the Tropicália movement emerged, which, although it only lasted for a few years, was to have a revolutionary impact on Brazilian art and culture. A major new exhibition, running until May 22 2006 at London’s Barbican Gallery, explores the movement’s many facets.

The 1968 album Tropicália ou Panis et Circencis featured rebellious musicians Gilberto Gil and Caetano Velosa. Artwork Rubens Gerchman.

Anti-authoritarian, interactive and sensualist, Tropicália was kick-started by a 1967 installation of the same name by Brazilian artist Hélio Oiticica. Recreated at the Barbican, it is an ironic depiction of a favela, complete with sand on the floor, huts covered by vinyl curtains, a television and even live macaw parrots.

This groundbreaking work, which challenged middle-class Brazilian views of their culture, was inspired by, and then went onto inspire, musicians like Gilberto Gil and Caetano Velosa. Singing rebellious lyrics to electric guitars, they collaborated on one of the most celebrated albums in Brazilian musical history – Tropicália ou Panis et Circencis (1968).

Gil became a leading light of the movement and after arrest and imprisonment in 1968 for his criticism of the military regime, subsequently went into exile in London.

Coloured liquids are there to be tasted...Lygia Pape, Rodas dos Prazeres (1968). © Lygia Pape.

Tropicália grew from visual art and music to include architecture, theatre, fashion and film and its impact is still felt in Brazil today. The exhibition is a comprehensive exploration of its themes and also includes contemporary ‘Tropicálist’ works, such as A Mudanca (The Move, 2005) by Marepe, a life-size wooden truck.

Alongside the seminal installation Tropicália, Hélio Oiticica’s even larger project Eden (1969) is reconstructed. It expands upon the earlier piece to include tents and booths with different textured flooring or headphones playing Tropicálist music.

Visitors are asked to take their shoes and socks off and walk through sand and over straw, foam and even into a water-filled pool.

This sensory exploration runs through many of the works on display, and museum staff are on hand to encourage visitors to interact with several pieces.

'Sensorial' masks and body suits aim to expand the wearer's experience. Photo Graham Spicer © 24HM.

Simple bowls containing brightly coloured liquids are arranged on one area of the floor and pipettes are provided so you can taste these mysterious fluids. Their taste seems to bear no relation to their colour – or do they? Removed from its familiar colour, can a coffee-flavoured drink still be called coffee?

Lygia Clark’s Sensorial Masks and The I and the You: Cloth-Body-Cloth series, both from 1967, continue this urge to experiment and challenge perceptions.

Original masks, goggles and suits are displayed next to new ones designed to be tried on by the audience – latex, wool, wire, metal and water are combined with other materials to create new sensations for the wearer.

The exhibition also explores work that led the way for the Tropicálists. Earlier artistic movements, like ‘concrete’ and ‘neoconcrete’ art, played on geometric and mathematical shapes, colour and and three-dimensional objects, rejecting traditional representational art.

The exhibition also contains contemporary Tropicálist works. Assume Vivid Astro Focus, Baby (2003). Courtesy John Connelly Present and Peres Projects.

Their playful approach and efforts to engage the viewer inspired the riot of colour and experimentation that came to define Tropicália.

Another piece, this time from 1966, epitomises the witty anti-authoritarian approach of the Brazilian avant-garde. O Porco (The Pig), by Nelson Leirner, is a large stuffed pig in a wooden crate.

Submitted to the Brasilica National Salon he intended to raise the question ‘what is art’ and when it was surprisingly accepted he publicly queried the jury’s selection criteria.

Elsewhere in the exhibition other aspects of Tropicália are shown, such as instruments by the influential musical innovator Walter Smetak, which he described as ‘sound forms’ and are as much sculptures as conventional musical instruments. Lina Bo Bardi’s architectural sketches and models combine traditional forms with a more modernist-style grace and functionality.

Gilberto Gil was one of the movement's leading lights and was made Brazilian minister for culture in 2003. Artwork Linda Glover and Johnny Clamp.

Film posters, videos, concert and theatre programmes, set models and costume drawings give an insight into the true breadth of the Tropicália movement and a taster for the wider programme of events organised around the exhibition. Along with talks and workshops there are dance performances, concerts, theatre and an extensive range of films.

Musical highlights include an orchestral performance of the Tropicália ou Panis et Circensis album and a concert by Gilberto Gil, who in 2003 was made minister of culture in the government of left-wing populist Lula da Silva.

Still relevant today, Topicália was more than just an art movement - it helped to transform Brazil’s culture from the austere conservatism of the military regime and champion Brazil’s rich cultural diversity.

While some parts of this ambitious exhibition are certainly challenging, it includes such a diverse range of work that even the most cynical visitor should enjoy it.