Chalk the Trail is free Friday morning at Arlington Park
Trail art, hopscotch and a scavenger hunt, 9:30 to noon, chalk supplied.
Chalk the Trail runs Friday, July 24, from 9:30 a.m. to noon at Arlington Park & Aquatic Complex, 2650 Waldemere St. It is free and open to all ages, and the RECing Crew is supplying the chalk, so there is nothing to buy and nothing to bring. The morning is built around the trail itself: chalk art goes down on the pavement, with outdoor games, hopscotch and a scavenger hunt running alongside it. There is also a create-your-own obstacle course, which means the course is something kids assemble rather than something already staked out when they arrive. The window is two and a half hours wide, and because there is no ticket and no age cutoff, a family can drop in for forty minutes or stay the whole stretch. It is part of the City of Sarasota's Park and Rec Month programming. (City of Sarasota)
Private screeners at SRQ are the model Tampa wants
Passenger screening at Sarasota Bradenton International Airport is run by a private security company rather than by federal screeners, and it has worked that way for more than a decade. That setup is now the thing Tampa International Airport says it is after. TPA officials have pointed to the TSA's Gold+ program as the route to better screening technology and a better customer experience at their own checkpoints, similar to what SRQ already has in place. For anyone flying out of Sarasota, the practical read is simple: the checkpoint you already walk through is the working example a much larger airport is trying to match, and nothing about it changes because Tampa is pursuing the same arrangement. The comparison runs the opposite direction from the usual one, with the smaller airport as the template. (WFLA)
Taking Venice screens this afternoon at Sarasota Art Museum
Art on Film screens Taking Venice on Thursday, July 23, from 2 to 4 p.m. at Sarasota Art Museum — today, if you are reading this in the morning. The 2023 documentary, directed by Amei Wallach, takes up the Cold War story around Robert Rauschenberg and the 1964 Venice Biennale. It is a two-hour block in the middle of a Thursday afternoon, which makes it a plan for anyone with a flexible schedule rather than a post-work option. Admission is worth confirming with the museum before you go. It runs under the museum's Art on Film banner. (Sarasota Art Museum)
Best of Sarasota voting runs through July 31
Voting in the Best of Sarasota 2026 awards has been extended through July 31, which leaves a little over a week from today. The finalists are already set, so the ballot is a choice among names that have made the cut rather than an open call for nominations. Sarasota Magazine published the extension on July 20. If you have been meaning to back a restaurant, a shop or a service you actually use and let it slide earlier in the month, the rest of July is the window where saying so still counts. (Sarasota Magazine)
A docent-led Highlights Tour runs Saturday at Sarasota Art Museum
Sarasota Art Museum runs a docent-led Highlights Tour on Saturday, July 25, from 11 a.m. to noon at 1001 South Tamiami Trail. The format is conversational rather than a lecture, walking a selection of the art currently on view with a docent leading the discussion. An hour is enough to get through a curated slice of the galleries without trying to see everything, which makes it a reasonable first visit for anyone who has driven past the building on Tamiami and never gone in. It also lands late enough in the morning to leave the rest of Saturday open. (Sarasota Art Museum)
HuMangrove brings dance-theater to Selby Library Saturday
Tania Vergara Dance-Theater performs HuMangrove on Saturday, July 25, at noon in the Rotunda at Selby Library. The contemporary dance piece draws on the mangrove root — resilient, and the thing that sustains life around it — as its central image. Noon on a Saturday puts it in the middle of the day downtown, short enough to fold into other plans and specific enough to build around. It is a Sarasota County Libraries program at the Selby branch. Dance built on a local ecological image is an unusual thing to catch in a library rotunda, and the mangrove framing gives the piece a subject anyone living on this coast already recognizes. (Sarasota County Libraries)
Patriotic Bingo at North Port Library Saturday afternoon
The 250th Celebration: Patriotic Bingo runs Saturday, July 25, at 2 p.m. in the Veranda Room at North Port Library. It is open to all ages and built for families and groups of friends to play together, which puts it in the small category of afternoon programs that work for a mixed-age group without splitting anyone off. North Port sits at the southern end of the county, so this is a local plan for that side rather than a drive most people would make from the city. Bingo needs no preparation and no prior interest in the theme, which is most of why it works as a family program. (Sarasota County Libraries)
Photography peer critique meets Monday at Art Center Sarasota
Artists on Art — A Peer Critique: Photography meets Monday, July 27, from 10:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. at Art Center Sarasota, 707 N Tamiami Trail. Admission is $5. Photographers can bring up to five physical prints or digital images to share, and the session is built around constructive feedback from the other participants rather than instruction from a single teacher. That is the useful distinction: you get several sets of eyes on your work, and you are expected to look at everyone else's too. Registration closes July 27 at 10:38 a.m., which is effectively the door time — if you decide Monday morning that you want in, the window to sign up is narrow. Two hours, five images, five dollars. (Art Center Sarasota)