The exhibition Samba Exaltação, by Felippe Moraes, is part of the celebration of the 25th anniversary of the Museu de Arte Contemporânea de Niterói, occupying its outdoor area with neon signs installed directly onto Oscar Niemeyer’s architecture. The show presents a panorama of neons developed since 2019, bringing together works never before shown in the state of Rio de Janeiro and visible from different points across the city. The exhibition features a curatorial text by Alexandre Sá.

Developed within the context of the pandemic, the Samba Exaltação series (2021– ) emerges as a response to the suspended 2021 Carnival, poetically elaborating on the absence of the celebration. The chosen verses, drawn from composers such as Caetano Veloso, Paulinho da Viola, and Nelson Sargento, activate a collective memory and function as affirmations of cultural resistance in the face of a moment of crisis.

The exhibition brings together different moments of Felippe Moraes’ production, including works stemming from the urban intervention carried out during isolation in São Paulo and later unfoldings in projects such as Samba da Luz. Installed within the museum context, the neons take on a new scale and enter into direct dialogue with the landscape of Guanabara Bay and the symbolism of the building and the museum institution.