From Cigar City to a hub for creativity: USF’s 70-year role in Ybor City

By Paul Guzzo, University Communications and Marketing

In the 1960s through early '70s, there was a saying about Ybor City's main thoroughfare:

"You could take a nap in the middle of Seventh Avenue and not worry about traffic," said Paul Wilborn, a 1975 USF graduate. "It was empty."

The situation was so dire that in 1970, Tampa officials proposed turning the district into a bullfighting arena.

Ybor was ultimately saved by bulls, but a different kind: the USF Bulls.

Artists - many from what today is known as USF's College of Design, Art & Performance - took over Ybor, opening galleries, staging shows and throwing parties that revived the district and laid the foundation for today's entertainment and residential hub.

USF turns 70 this year.

And Ybor is celebrating its 140th anniversary.

Though their births are decades apart, their art history remains deeply connected.

"Ybor's revival started with USF artists," said Andrew Ross, director of USF's School of Art and Art History. "They transformed the neighborhood into a cultural hub."

Their connection continues.

Ybor's Reverb Gallery is leased by USF and run by master of fine arts students - becoming a key space for student-led exhibitions, bridging the university with Tampa's arts community.

"Ybor has always been intertwined with the university's art history," said Sarah Howard, an assistant dean of student success for USF. "Bringing students back here makes that legacy feel alive again."

Meanwhile, in their second-story Ybor studio, USF alumni David Audet, '77, and Joe Howden, '80, are finishing a sprawling diorama that tells Ybor's history with an oversized focus on the 1970s art movement of which they were a part.

"Ybor was rife with energy - bohemian art shops, artists working everywhere," Howden said. "It's an overlooked part of Ybor's history."

From cigars to canvases

Founded in the late 1880s by cigar magnate Vicente Martinez-Ybor, Ybor City grew from scrublands into a bustling immigrant enclave powered by hand-rolled cigar factories, earning Tampa the nickname "Cigar City."

But by the 1960s, automation, labor strife and changing tastes left behind shuttered factories and empty streets.

That's when city leaders floated a plan to build a bullfighting arena in Ybor, complete with hotels, restaurants and shops. The state approved the idea, but it fizzled.

USF was chartered in 1956 and opened in 1960.

Eight years later, USF founded Graphicstudio, a collaborative art research studio that produces limited-edition prints and sculptures with leading and emerging artists. Then, in 1970, Theo Wujcik became its shop director, cementing the marriage of USF and Ybor.

Internationally known as a printmaker and lithographer, Wujcik lured top artists to Tampa to create, guest lecture and take residencies at Graphicstudio.

At Wujcik's urging, these visiting artists, like pop-art icon James Rosenquist, lived and worked from studio space in Ybor.

"For $200 a month you could rent a giant apartment with light pouring in," said Wilborn, who chronicled that era in his book "Cigar City: Tales from a 1980's Creative Ghetto". "It was the starving artist's dream."

Wujcik and his visiting artists then introduced their students to Ybor. They followed - moving into cheap apartments and studios - turning the town into a bohemian scene.

"Theo was a Pied Piper for Ybor," said Beverly Coe, who attended USF in the 1970s and then worked as Rosenquist's assistant. "Where Theo went, the energy followed. If you asked a USF arts student where they were going that night, most of the time they said Ybor."

Then came Bud Lee.

Costumes, culture and change

Named Life Photographer of the Year in 1967, Lee was inspired by stories of 1920s Paris parties where artists and models adopted themes and lived them for a night. When Lee settled in Tampa in the 1970s, he decided to start his own version.

That idea came to fruition when he judged a photo contest at USF in 1977. Audet, pursuing a fine arts degree, was one of the contestants. The two hit it off, and Lee recruited Audet for his party concept. Other USF artists like Wilborn and Coe joined the cause, and, together, they formed the Artists and Writers Group.

Through the early 1990s, they hosted the annual Artists and Writers Ball at Ybor's Cuban Club. Each year featured a different theme, with the building transformed and thousands arriving in elaborate costumes. For the Daughters of the Bizarro theme, discarded newspapers became a psychedelic jungle of flowers and vines, while the Disney-Dali Cartoon Ball imagined a surreal child of Salvador Dali and Walt Disney.

Revelers flocked, rediscovered Ybor, and then came back again to visit the shops, bars and cafes that opened in response to the new crowds. By the 1980s, other events were regular - like jazz concerts in Ybor's Centennial Park.

In 1985, Wilborn helped launch Guavaween, an annual Ybor City Halloween festival that took over the district with a themed costume parade. By the 1990s, more than 100,000 attended each year, and marquee bands like Cheap Trick were booked.

Audet also branched off, founding Hillsborough Community College's Ybor Festival of the Moving Image in 2003. The annual film festival drew thousands to the district and filmmakers from around the world.

By the early 2000s, Ybor became known as an entertainment district. More businesses moved in. Apartments and condominium buildings were erected and old homes restored.

The Artists & Writers Ball, film festival and Guavaween eventually faded away - but Ybor never did.

USF's Ybor revival

USF artists remained in Ybor in some capacity, but the 2024 opening of Reverb - a gallery space within the larger three-story Kress Contemporary arts building that includes nine galleries, a black box theater, event space and 28 studios - marks the first university-approved hub there.

While USF has campus galleries, the university wanted students connected to the broader community, said Patrick Carew, a third-year MFA student and director of Reverb Gallery.

"It puts our artists in direct conversation with the Ybor arts scene," he said. "It's a way to raise our visibility."

The gallery also provides leadership experience, with a different MFA student directing it each year and curating the student shows.

"The most exciting thing the school has done while I've been here for the graduate program was giving us Reverb," said Tom Rosenow, a recent MFA graduate who served as Reverb's founding director. "It empowered us to build a gallery from the ground up."

And the Tempus Project, which serves as an anchor gallery in the Kress Contemporary building, also partners with USF to provide internships that teach students everything from installation and event management to gallery administration.

"It's about tapping into one of the most respected art programs in the region," said Tracy Midulla, founder and creative director of the Tempus Project. "Their faculty, students and resources bring a level of rigor and creativity that elevates everything we do at Kress Contemporary. Together, we're creating opportunities that prepare students for real careers while keeping Ybor's artistic legacy alive."

Audet and Howden hope their diorama helps keep that spirit alive too.

Titled "Tampa Town," it showcases Ybor's founding cigar magnates, influential business owners and politicians, while giving equal prominence to the artists Wujcik, Wilborn, Coe, Lee, and even Audet and Howden themselves - alongside nods to the legendary parties and events that shaped the district's cultural identity.

"It's not just a diorama - it's a time capsule," Audet said. "Every figure tells a story about Ybor's soul. It was built on creativity."