‘Spring Ephemerals’ heralds the new season in Brooksville exhibit
Show features local works in oils, watercolors, wood and fibers
Bird sculpture by Richard Merrill. Photo by Marilyn Eckberg.
April 8, 2026
By Marilyn Eckberg
BROOKSVILLE—A new art show in Brooksville is welcoming in the new season after the long winter.
“Spring Ephemerals” at Reversing Falls Sanctuary showcases creativity united by themes of flowers, birds, light and hope.
First, there are flowers. Screenprinted snowdrops by Sarah Scamperle, delicate early blooming watercolors by Elizabeth Moran, and vivid flower portraits painted in oils on boards by Annie Poole. Across the room, you’ll see Sherry Streeter’s symmetrically arranged oil paintings of unfolding flowers and green stems. Appreciate the Japanese feel of Diane Alice Chamberlain’s tender pencil and watercolor rendering of a cut blossoming tree branch. The corners display flowers by Carol Benson in watercolor and flowers by Joan Tibbits in acrylic and gouache. Sam Gorelick made a garden collage, Daksha Baumann rounds out the theme with felted corsage pins.
Next comes some whimsy. A charming green ”book” illustrating a lush forest floor, done in ink and watercolor wash by Kristy Cunnae. First-time exhibitor Carla Scocchi created adorable felt and embroidery finger puppets waving trillium, trout lily, liverleaf, and solomon’s seal for her grandchildren, inspired by the classic children’s book, “The Story of the Root Children.”
Visitors can also see Constance Myrick’s arrangement of objects, “Violet Needlepoint with Fairy” that blends nature, tradition and needle skills with family history. Sarah Leighton gave her small embroidered creatures the fanciful names of “Cloud Mama,” “Sunshine Rabbit,” and “Rainbow Girl.”
Birds herald spring, and Gail Paige, in the show’s only truly abstract painting, evokes movement with her acrylic on canvas titled “Migration.” Richard Merrill caught birds mid- flight with his elegant copper, brass and driftwood bird sculptures.
Adjacent paintings and collages seem to respond to Daksha Baumann’s wool, mixed fibers and thread construction poetically titled “At least my despair and hopelessness is ephemeral.” Daryne Rockett asked “What gives you hope?” and answered it with a month's worth of daily collage disks fastened into a handmade accordion book. Her book is displayed beneath three more of her collages featuring the shapes of ferns. Tara Taylor’s vigorous “Emergence” collage complements these ideas. Leslie Bevis captures light in her acrylic paintings. She shines light bursting through a window changing the illumination of everyday objects, depending upon time of day and year.
If I have one quibble with “Spring Ephemerals,” it would be the placement of Susan Barrett Merrill’s “3 Sisters as Triptych.” Considering the seriousness of these fiber sculptures and the labors involved, these pieces deserve a more dramatic display. With subject matter and technique given to her in a dream, Merrill makes three-dimensional female faces wearing elaborate headdresses. Fashioned from vegetable dyed handspun wool, Merrill fashions and embellishes these sisters by weaving, felting, crocheting and beading. Titled “Song of the Soul,” “Comforting the Grieving Heart” and “Birth of Love” these sculptures are powerful in design and concept.
“Spring Ephemerals” is showing at Reversing Falls Sanctuary, 818 Bagaduce Road in Brooksville through May 30.
The Rising Tide welcomes artistic endeavors from our community, and showcases them here in our “Create” section. If you have something you’d like to submit—a poem, a picture of a painting, a photograph, a music recording—send it to info@risingtide.media. We’d love to publish it and give you an audience for your creativity.
