Walking down 29th Ave. S. in downtown Gulfport, you can see a white mosaic arrow rimmed in red tile, with the word "Art" tiled in navy blue. The arrow points to Gulfport's Alley of the Arts, also known as Artist Alley, home of Tom Pitzen's studio.
If you've ever visited Gulfport, you've probably seen Pitzen's work. It started small, with a bathroom remodel at home, then radiated through town. Now over a dozen of his mosaic sculptures canvas the area, from Gulfport to St. Pete. There's the waterfront sign and two sculptures in Gulfport's Clymer Park — a dancer, “Ethereal,” and a mosaic orchid, “Nec mortem effugere quisquam nec amorem potest”; six parking signs south of Gulfport Blvd. (and more to come); a skater in front of the Gulfport 49th Street Neighborhood Center; eight sculptures in St. Pete's Riviera Bay Park; and a lotus flower in front of St. Pete's new Burlington Place apartments.
Tom credits these large public art projects with giving him the freedom to quit his day job. In between big commissions, his patrons provide the small projects and support to keep him going. Now, he only has to spend about 5 percent of his time actively looking for work. The other 95 percent, he creates.
At the moment, Pitzen is the only full-time artist working on Gulfport's Artist Alley, but it wasn't always that way. At its peak, around 2012, there were three artists working in the alley: Owen Pach, Victoria Wenner and Jonathan Schork. The late Jackie Ballard pre-dated them, with her glass art; she later worked at the now-defunct Industrial Art Center across 29th.
“There were times when they would have really large parties, and there'd be lights strung up everywhere, and music going,” says Pitzen. “It was really a happening place.”
By the time Pitzen moved into the alley, a few years ago, only Owen Pach remained. Pach had a decent draw of customers, something which influenced Tom’s initial decision to move into Schork’s old studio on Artist Alley. Pach, however, left Artist Alley in 2015.
Given Gulfport’s reputation as an arts community, it’s surprising that Artist Alley lost three artists in a period of three years. It shows that even in a supportive community, making it as an artist isn’t easy. Yet Tom has thrived where others didn't. How did he get here?
“When I was little,” he says, “my grandfather lived with us and he had a shop in the basement. I was just watching all the time. I would stay in there and he would make stuff. My school projects — he would pretty much take control of them, but I would stand there and watch everything that he did. That’s probably where it started. My dad, originally, he was a contractor so I grew up kind of in the construction business.
“My grandma used to bring me books on Michelangelo, Da Vinci... Then I had an art teacher [who] pushed me fully into architecture. I would get to go into woodshop whenever I wanted, and do whatever I wanted in woodshop. It just kind of all happened that way. A lot of teachers, really, just kind of like pushing me one way or the other. I used to have a picture of Bob Vila from my little wood shop in the basement that I had in high school.
“I graduated from the Ohio State University School of Architecture, and worked for artists there. I wanted to be an artist for a little while, then I gave it up. I lived in a little artist community for a while in Columbus when I was single. I had to submit a portfolio to live and work there.
"I did stuff, and then I just felt like it was garbage, that I needed to make a living. So I went into the construction business, because I got a chance to design. I would design kitchens, bathrooms...so I got my design fix, and then my hands-on fix of doing it."
After moving to Florida in 2002, Pitzen also started getting commissions in Gulfport — the skater in front of the Neighborhood Center was his first for the city.
That's when, he says, “I thought, ‘I really should have been doing the artist stuff a long time ago.’”
Here are a few tips from Tom on how to do "the artist stuff” full-time.
1. Find a couple of good patrons
“I do have a few people, like three, to varying degrees, but they buy multiple things from me. And there are also people, I can like, if I'm slow, I can call them up and say, ‘Hey, would you like another piece of art?’ And they'll be like, ‘Yeah, we kind of do.’”
2. Don't be shy when you're on the hunt for jobs
“People have asked me how I've gotten certain jobs, and I've said, ‘I butt my nose into everything.’ And I try to follow up on all my leads. And then I also do a lot of maker stuff — I do some furniture-making but with a little more sculptural theme to it. I've made some light fixtures. I've done some light commercial jobs you can see, like, in the Modern Man Salon.”
3. Find your customers
“I think, like with the St. Petersburg art thing, I had applied to dozens and dozens of public art competitions, and I have a stack of rejection letters an inch thick at home — I keep them. So you can't be afraid to get disappointed, I guess. I think I spend more time trying not to be disappointed than I do applying for the job. I said I spend 5 percent on the business side, but yet I'll spend 5 percent of the time just trying not to be disappointed. It's hard, you know, but that's the biggest one.”
4. Ignore the critics
“I've always had my critics in the past. You can't really listen to a lot of that. I mean, take it with a grain of salt. When I first did the big historic waterfront sign in Gulfport, when I was putting it together out there in the park, people would drive past and swear at me and call me names and give me the finger. When I was putting tiles on it, finishing up, they would come up to me and tell me how ugly it was, and why did I do this and that? I just tried to let it roll and not think too much about it. And then on social media, I was getting bashed constantly.
“But after about six months of it being up, everybody loved it. All the local merchants and everybody just thought it was great because people would say, ‘I never realized Gulfport was there until I saw that sign and I thought, 'Wow! Gulfport is a great spot!’”
