Sarasota Chalk Festival’s Venice debut is gearing up to be a global event with an announcement of the group’s intention to break a Guinness Book World Record to set the stage for this year’s festivities. The crew will endeavor to create the world’s "Largest Anamorphic Pavement Art," gathering artists from across the world, including Kurt Wenner, the founder of anamorphic pavement art, a meticulous and calculated style that mimics a three-dimensional appearance on a two-dimensional surface.

This wasn’t always part of the plan, said Denise Kowal, founder and volunteer organizer of the festival since its inception, but once the opportunity presented itself, they couldn’t resist.

“We wanted to create something monumental out there,” said Kowal, referring to the immense lot set aside at the Venice Municipal Airport Festival Grounds, just one of various locations that festival-goers will be able to visit during the festival. “It’s massive and we decided ‘Let’s go for a world record.’ It’s a project that all of the artists are getting behind.”

With the return of Wenner to the festival, whose anamorphic creation in 2012, “Circus Parade,” (pictured above) was met with great acclaim, and the return of pavement artist Julie Kirk, also a global expert in anamorphic pavement art, along with agreed participation from several other artists from around the world, including France, Mexico, Russia, Ukraine and Japan, Kowal has every confidence that the team will bring the record home for everybody.

“This is a community event,” said Kowal of the attempt. “This is not just a Venice thing and it’s not just a Florida thing; we are winning it for the USA.”

The current title was awarded in Germany in 2012, for a piece measuring 16,900 square feet, more than doubling the previous record awarded in 2007 for an 8,073 square foot creation. Current world record holder Gregor Wosik is also on Kowal’s team this year.

Following this year’s theme, Endangered and Extinct Species, the plan is to create a giant underwater seascape across the ground, to create the appearance that the asphalt just “gave way to an underwater abyss.” Some 3D images pop out, this will be as a window, looking into the Earth and into its past, when great seas spread across the land. Populated with extinct and endangered sea life (plants and animals) and with a great Megalodon Shark as the centerpiece in tribute to Venice’s position as Shark Tooth Capital of the World, the plans are truly grand.

“That piece was about 1,800 square feet,” said Kowal of Wenner’s last anamorphic creation at the festival in 2012. “This year we’re going to create something that’s 18,900 square feet—10 times larger. It’s exciting. It’s exhilarating.”

Exhilarating as it may be, this is a giant undertaking, especially for a non-profit such as the Chalk Festival, driven by volunteer power and community spirit, so Kowal has left an interesting window open for sponsor involvement. Those in the community who sponsor the festival to a significant degree will be given the opportunity to insert themselves or an individual of their choice into the piece, sketched amongst the rocks and shoals by one of the many artists.

Though the festival does not begin until Nov. 14, the mass of participating artists will descend upon Venice two weeks early, volunteering their time to prepare this record-breaking opening. In addition, a documentarian from the Netherlands and about 50 local videographers and photographers will be on-hand, creating a documentary film of the project.