oiticica

They evoke the regalia worn by ghost dancers, papal robes and the outfits created by such performance artists as Magdalena Abakanowicz, Hermann Nitsch and Hélio Oiticica.

“Heart Tub” knows its place among other bodies of water in museums, most notably a work from the Museum of Contemporary Art’s 2010 exhibition “Suprasensorial: Experiments in Light, Color, and Space,” which included a 1973 pool installation by Brazilian artists Hélio Oiticica and Neville D’Almeida titled “CC4 Nocagions.”

“It’s not just a parade of samba schools down the avenue,” said Manuela Oiticica, a composer who writes samba songs for schools like Mangueira and Portela.

But Oiticica had some particular people in mind when he concocted his earliest capes.

But it was precisely flimsiness, precariousness and fragility that Oiticica wanted to highlight.