The Free Wednesdays and Opening Days That Set This Season at Artis-Naples on Pelican Bay Boulevard

The Baker Museum keeps short hours: Tuesday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., and Sunday from noon to 4 p.m. One Wednesday a month, those hours stretch to 9 p.m., there is live music, and admission costs nothing.

For neighbors along Pelican Bay Boulevard, those five Wednesday nights between now and the end of March do more to shape the season than any headline concert. Four exhibitions are changing at the museum this winter, and the free evenings, two well-stacked Saturdays, and a holiday concert that includes museum admission decide when each one fits into an ordinary week.

The museum closes at 4, except on the last Wednesday

Art After Hours runs from 6 to 9 p.m. on the last Wednesday of each month. It offers free admission to every exhibition, live music from local musicians, and concessions at Heidi's Place. The season's remaining dates, set against what will be on the walls each night:

The exhibition column comes from the run dates WGCU reported when the season was announced. "The Surrealist International: Fifty Years of Dreams," drawn from Tate's collection, runs through Feb. 14, 2027. "Baron Wolman: Capturing the Sound of an Era," organized with the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, opens Dec. 5 and runs through June 13. "Louise Nevelson: Dawn to Dusk" opens Feb. 13 and runs through July 11. "The Long View: From Conservation to Sustainability," from the Bank of America Collection, opens March 20 and runs through Aug. 15.

January 27 is the last free evening with the Tate surrealists

The Surrealist International closes on Sunday, Feb. 14. The February Art After Hours falls ten days after that, on Feb. 24, so the Jan. 27 "Rock the Museum" night with the Charlie Pace Band is the last free evening to see the Tate loan.

The "Dreamscapes" theme for Feb. 24 sounds like a send-off for the surrealists, but by then Louise Nevelson's work will have taken over that part of the season. If the Tate show is the one you meant to see, the remaining free nights are Nov. 25, Dec. 30 and Jan. 27. Regular admission covers any other day. Adult admission is $10. It is $5 for full-time students and active military with ID, $1 for eligible SNAP EBT cardholders, and free for children 17 and under and for Friends of Artis-Naples. Bank of America, Merrill and Bank of America Private Bank cardholders get one free general admission during the first full weekend of each month when they show an active card and photo ID.

Two Saturdays stack an opening with a free concert

Each of the two winter openings shares its date with a free youth performance on the same campus. The first is Saturday, Dec. 5:

1. During museum hours: "Baron Wolman: Capturing the Sound of an Era" opens at the Baker Museum.
2. 4 p.m.: The Naples Philharmonic Youth Orchestra's Fall Chamber Ensembles concert, free, at Ubben Signature Event Space.
3. 7 p.m.: Naples Ballet's "The Nutcracker" with the Naples Philharmonic in Hayes Hall. There are two more performances on Sunday, Dec. 6, at 2 and 7 p.m.

The second is Saturday, Feb. 13. "Louise Nevelson: Dawn to Dusk" opens that day, and the Youth Orchestra's free Winter Concert begins at 2 p.m. in Hayes Hall. Because The Surrealist International closes the next day, Feb. 13 and 14 are the only two days when Tate's surrealists and Nevelson's sculpture are both on view.

The youth calendar keeps going after that, and almost all of it is free:

• Feb. 20, 11 a.m.: Youth Symphonia Winter Concert, Daniels Pavilion
• Feb. 27, 4 p.m.: Youth Orchestra Winter Chamber Ensembles, Ubben Signature Event Space
• March 1, 7 p.m.: Youth Chorus Winter Concert, held off campus at Moorings Presbyterian
• March 7, 7 p.m.: Youth Jazz Orchestra Winter Concert, Daniels Pavilion

December's Holiday Pops ticket includes the museum

The December run begins with Handel's "Messiah" on Thursday, Dec. 3, at 7:30 p.m. in Hayes Hall, performed by the Naples Philharmonic and Naples Philharmonic Chorus. Tickets start at $29. Jodie DeSalvo's "Home for the Holidays" follows on Dec. 10 at 7 p.m. in Daniels Pavilion, with vocalists Kellie Cullinan and Matthew Swingle.

Holiday Pops is the one that connects back to the museum. Nicholas Hersh conducts, with vocalist Caroline Bowman, the Naples Philharmonic Chorus and the Youth Chorus. Performances run Dec. 17 and 18 at 7:30 p.m., Dec. 19 at 2 and 7:30 p.m., and Dec. 20 at 2 p.m. Tickets include same-day admission to the Baker Museum, and the museum stays open from 10 a.m. to 7:30 p.m. on Dec. 17 through 19. On those three days, an evening ticket buys an afternoon with the surrealists and the Wolman photographs before the downbeat.

The rest of December is for families. The Rowe Center hosts two make-and-take workshops, each from 2 to 4 p.m.: "Colorful Creations" on Dec. 22 and "Surreal Drawings" on Dec. 29. Both are free with museum admission, and museum admission is already free for anyone 17 and under. The next evening, Dec. 30, brings the "Luminous Nights" Art After Hours with The Rick Howard Trio, one of the last three free nights to see The Surrealist International.

Daytime visits come with a guide

Between free nights, the museum's own programming does more with a regular admission. From October through May, the Baker Museum lists free docent-led exhibition tours Tuesday through Saturday at 11 a.m. and 2 p.m., and Sundays at 1 p.m. From November through May, outdoor sculpture tours run Thursdays at 10 a.m. A 2 p.m. tour ends with time to spare before the 4 p.m. closing, which matters during a show with as much ground to cover as Fifty Years of Dreams.

Two newer formats also use the daytime campus. The Carnegie Hall partnership brings "Music at Midday: Carnegie Hall's Well-Being Concert" to Ubben Signature Event Space at noon on Jan. 20 and March 24, with seating in the round and wellness elements built into the program. The Artis-Wellness series offers music-therapy workshops with FGCU's Jaley Montgomery at the Rowe Center on Feb. 4 and March 11 at 7 p.m.

The ticketed peaks, and where they meet the free calendar

The 2026-27 season runs under the theme "To Light: The Art of Hope." Alexander Shelley, in his third season as artistic and music director, leads the Naples Philharmonic through all nine Beethoven symphonies on March 4, 6, 18, 19 and 20. Around that cycle, the Hayes Hall calendar includes:

• "Hamilton," Nov. 24 through 29
• Renée Fleming and Thomas Hampson with the Naples Philharmonic, Jan. 7 and 9
• The Cleveland Orchestra, Jan. 26 and 31
• The Munich Philharmonic's Naples debut with Lahav Shani and Anne-Sophie Mutter, Feb. 15
• "The Sound of Music," Feb. 23 through 28
• The London Symphony Orchestra, March 9
• "The Notebook," March 23 through 28

Yo-Yo Ma plays a recital with pianist Solon Gordon on Jan. 8, and ODC/Dance makes its Naples debut with the Naples Philharmonic on Jan. 12, performing to a newly commissioned score by Mason Bates.

Two of those runs overlap with the free calendar. "Hamilton" is in Hayes Hall during the Nov. 25 Art After Hours, and "The Sound of Music" is on stage the week of the Feb. 24 Art After Hours. The Cleveland Orchestra plays Jan. 26, the night before the Jan. 27 free evening.

Getting there on a free night

The campus address is 5833 Pelican Bay Boulevard. For evening and weekend events, Artis-Naples directs patrons to its own campus lots, its partner lots across Ridgewood Drive, and levels 3 through 5 of the Waterside Shops parking garage. Waterside's surface lots are also part of the partnership. A free club-style cart shuttles patrons between the Waterside garage and the east entrance to Hayes Hall. 5 Star Valet serves most Hayes Hall performances but not free events, so Art After Hours and the youth concerts depend on self-parking. Accessible spaces are near the Hayes Hall main entrance. Artis-Naples asks anyone who may have difficulty walking from Waterside Shops to arrive early for a spot in the campus lots. That advice is most useful on Nov. 25, when the free evening and a "Hamilton" performance share the campus.

The last free campus-wide day of the season is Spring Community Day on May 22, 2027, from noon to 4 p.m.

If you are weighing which Pelican Bay setting puts Hayes Hall and the Baker Museum within easy reach of your evenings, I would be glad to share what I know about the neighborhood around the campus. Michelle Trawick is here when you are ready. Let's Connect.