Arts
and Culture are a vital component of Tampa Bay's vibrant community.
Theater groups, orchestras, world-class performance halls, museums,
galleries and much more provide enriching performances, inspirational
youth education programs, and exhibits that showcase the world's most
talented artists, actors and musicians. Tampa
Bay cherishes arts and history and keeps it a unique and powerful tool
to showcase the area's heritage and diverse culture.
It's no wonder that Tampa Bay was recently awarded the distinction "Top Arts Destination” by American Style Magazine. With independent and foreign film, critically acclaimed opera and orchestra, a stellar Broadway series and an eclectic collage of museums featuring everything the surreal masterworks of Salvador Dali to traveling exhibitions from the Smithsonian - the Tampa Bay area is fast becoming the cultural core of Florida’s Gulf Coast.
In Tampa, art is everywhere. Even when visitors arrive at the Tampa International Airport
they will immediately recognize the city’s ardor for the arts.
Travelers will enjoy flights of imagination while moving through the
airport thanks to a multitude of sculptures, tapestries, acrylic and
oil paintings created by local and international artists that are on
display in high-traffic areas.
Many of Tampa’s cultural centers are clustered downtown along the Hillsborough River in Downtown Tampa.
Amidst high-rise office buildings and fine hotels, the Tampa Theatre, Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center, Tampa Museum of Art, Henry B. Plant Museum, Tampa Bay History Center and many displays of public art
can be found to peak one’s cultural curiosity. Tampa Bay also hosts an
array of arts and cultural events year round. Make sure to check out
our calendar of events and cultural calendar for updated arts and culture event information.
The cigar industry, originally brought to Tampa
in the late 1800s by Don Vicente Martinez Ybor, created a 12,000-strong
immigrant workforce that churned out 700 million cigars a year.
It also created a vivacious Latin
community, a "cultural collage," where Spaniards, Italians, Cubans,
Germans and Romanian Jews worked and lived side by side. Today, Tampa
is as much a multi-cultural city as ever with a thriving and powerful
Hispanic population that represents all different Latin American
countries. In all, approximately 10% of Tampa's
population are Latino and one recent study reported that one out of
every three people in Tampa bears a Hispanic surname.
Tampa is such a multi-cultural hotbed
that the city was has made Hispanic Magazine's list of "Top Cities for
Hispanics" three years running, topping the list in 2000. Most
recently, the Tampa Bay area was named one of the top five most
diverse, integrated urban areas in the country by the U.S. Census
Bureau. View our multicultural guide for a sample list of things to do.
Discover the rich arts and culture of Tampa Bay and the many wonders that await you!
