Current Grounds4Art Projects

HCC Ybor City Performing Arts Building, 1411 E. 11th Ave., Tampa

Hotel Haya, 1412 E. Seventh Ave., Tampa

Tempus Projects, 1624 E. Seventh Ave., Tampa

Now On View, a free public art festival organized by HCC Art Galleries, brings four hours of interactive poetry, dance, and art projects to Ybor City. This one-day-only event features six Tampa Bay area artists exploring Tampa’s past, present, and future through a variety of creative disciplines. Below is a preview of the projects being presented by this year’s featured artists.

Legacy Systems 

A Sculptural Video, Sound Installation & Dance Performance

By Dance Professor Amanda Gabaldon, musician Ben Sperduto, and artist Emma Quintana

📍Gallery114@HCC Ybor and the HCC Ybor Performing Arts Building Lobby, 1411 E. 11th Ave.

This immersive installation explores climate change within Tampa Bay—a region that embodies both the excesses of extreme commercial tourism and the vulnerability of a landscape increasingly shaped by disasters driven by overconsumption.

Through a dynamic fusion of sculpture, video, sound and movement, Legacy Systems examines the paradox of human-made systems that fuel both economic prosperity and environmental collapse. 

Visitors leave with a free postcard designed by Quintana featuring a humorous, retro aesthetic that playfully contrasts Florida’s iconic beach culture with the unpredictability of its severe weather.

Resilient Rhythms: Honoring Tampa’s Diverse Dance Voices

A dance battle led by Jehoshaphat Jacinto and Tampa’s street dance community

📍Ybor Building Patio, 2001 N. 14th St.

This unique, immersive street dance battle celebrates Ybor City’s rich and diverse blend of dance cultures, with a special focus on amplifying the voices and contributions of minorities and the LGBTQIA+ community.

Resilient Rhythms showcases top dancers from various styles thriving in the Tampa area, including Freestyle Hip-Hop, Litefeet, Popping, Locking, Breaking, Vogue, Waacking and House Dance—styles that have been essential expressions for marginalized communities worldwide.

Between rounds, Jacinto and crew share stories and offer brief “how-to” demos so attendees can try moves alongside the dancers. 

everything is built on layers on top of other layers on top of other layers

A large-scale installation of poetry and art collage by FAX 727 289 3069

📍Hotel Haya, 1412 E. Seventh Ave.

FAX 727 289 3069 imagines a story of Ybor, referencing many years of history, glimpsed through a window for one afternoon only.

Keifer Calkins, Eleanor Eichenbaum and Tyler Gillespie, known as FAX 727 289 3069, constructed a fictional history of Tampa through layers of handmade fliers — these public postings reflect research in historical archives as well as contemporary imagery. FAX invites viewers to engage with various aspects of Ybor’s vibrant history through text and image; from pirates to punks to lounge singers to cigars. 

Outside the Hotel Haya’s Café Quiquiriqui, FAX will greet visitors with poetry on pillars, hanging pennants, and free handmade buttons.

The Cosmos 

An immersive botanical experience by Kali Rabaut

📍Hotel Haya, 1412 E. Seventh Ave.

Botanical artist Kali Rabaut creates immersive experiences that connect us to time, place and the natural world. Using Tampa-grown botanical elements, she transforms flowers into storytelling devices — helping express what words often cannot.

Her latest installation, an infinity mirror garden, invites guests to step into a mesmerizing floral galaxy, where reflections seem endless, much like the cycles of nature. Every flower in this space begins as a carefully selected and hand-saved seed, nurtured by pollinators, farmers and florists.

As visitors wander through the installation, they become part of this vast web of connectivity — past, present, and future intertwined through the botanical world. And when they leave, they’ll carry that connection forward with a handful of seeds to plant, continuing the cycle of growth and renewal.

Ybor Interrupted 

A 15-minute site-specific play by Erin Lekovic

📍Kress Contemporary, 1624 E. Seventh Ave.

Erin Lekovic invites audiences to embrace — and interrogate — history in a new 15-minute, site-specific play. Inspired by Samuel Kress, the five-and-dime magnate whose store once stood on this very spot, Ybor Interrupted weaves past and present into a layered theatrical experience.

Set in both the 1910s and today, the story follows a newly arrived Samuel Kress as he attempts to charm a cigar factory heiress — while rumors swirl that he’s daring to sell New York cigars in Ybor City. Featuring Annalise Drab as Roberta, Matt Twarog as Samuel Kress, and Dylan Bange as Mira, Ybor Interrupted reimagines history with wit and intrigue. How does Kress’ legacy hold up in the present day? Come see for yourself —performances at 10:45 a.m., 11:45 a.m., 12:45 p.m. and 1:45 p.m.

Back to Black

A temperature-sensitive installation revealing Tampa’s LGBTQIA+ history by Victoria Alvarez 

📍Kress Contemporary, 1624 E. Seventh Ave.

Tampa native and LGBTQIA+ advocate Victoria Alvarez celebrates Tampa’s LGBTQIA+ history with a new temperature-sensitive installation at Kress Contemporary.

Tampa has a long history of its LGBTQIA+ community. The queer pioneers of the 1950s left Tampa with safe spaces, churches and memories that show the queer community was not just a current wave of transplants but something that holds strong in the very fabric of Tampa’s history.

Alvarez shares this history through photographs of Tampa’s LGBTQIA+ community, which she’s collected, collaged and covered in black, heat-sensitive ink. Many were taken at bars and homes, demonstrating that even though many aspects of personal freedoms have been gained, there is still a need for spaces that offer comfort and acceptance.

When cooled, the 10-foot wide by 5-foot-tall poster is completely black. It takes body heat from physical touch to reveal the images underneath. At this size, one person cannot fully reveal the underlying images by themselves before the poster reverts to its black state. This act demonstrates that, as in life, the LGBTQ+ cannot survive without constant, unwavering support from our surrounding communities. We will disappear behind the black.

Reserve your ticket for our Now on View walking tours on our Eventbrite page.

TOUR #1 @ 10 a.m.
TOUR #2 @ 11 a.m.
TOUR #3 @ 12 p.m.
TOUR #4 (en español) @ 1 p.m.