Artistic celebration set for June 28

This photo of Lindsey Reimsnyder’s lemony cake was one of her submissions for the Rainbow Springs Art in Dunnellon’s scholarship. [Submitted photo]

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Posted June 23, 2025 | By Margo Wilson, Special to the Gazette

June 28 will be a cake and sip Saturday when the Rainbow Springs Art in Dunnellon gallery celebrates its move to new quarters, the addition of 11 new artists and the awarding of two, $1,500 scholarships to two area high school graduates who want to study the arts in college.

The festivities will take place from noon to 3 p.m. at the gallery, at 20826 Walnut St., Dunnellon. This is the first community event the gallery is hosting since it moved in May from quarters one block away.

The new artists are Denise Scripter, pottery; Erica Sauve, mosaics; Jude Gonzalez, jewelry; Sharon Dolce O’Keefe, hyper-realistic acrylics; Sean Mullins, oil painting; Larry and Karen Burden, woodwork; Sharon Vickery, fired pottery and stoneware; Thomas Lampkins, abstract acrylic painting; Marianne Pagel, jewelry; and Martha Pelot, abstract acrylic painting and yoga.

The scholarship recipients are Sedona Stackpoole, who recently graduated from Lecanto High and specializes in acrylics, and Lindsey Reimsnyder, who recently graduated from Belleview High School and specializes in culinary arts, particularly baking and pastries.

Both Stackpoole and Lindsey run their own small businesses. Sedona silkscreens T-shirts and fashions keychains and earrings. Lindsey creates cakes and other dessert delectables through her Tick Tock Confections.

Stackpoole, 18, plans to attend Flagler University and focus on art history, fine arts and art administration. She said she thinks she’d like to be an art teacher, although she’s not sure if she’d like to concentrate on middle school or high school. Eventually, she might get into museum work. To help her get a jump on required general education college classes, like English and math, she studied at the College of Central Florida while simultaneously attending high school.

She and her parents, Sara and Bradley, and her sister, Sinjalee, moved to the Dunnellon/Citrus Springs area eight years ago after living “all over” because Bradley was in the military. Some of their stops included Georgia and Missouri.

Stackpoole attended Citrus Middle School and Lecanto High’s School of the Arts. She said she’s always drawn but wasn’t sure she wanted to pursue an artistic path until her middle school art teacher and her uncle encouraged her. Her uncle does digital drawings and comic book-like art. Sinjalee also is a digital artist.

For Stackpoole, computers are a tool she uses, but her passion right now is acrylic painting.

“I tried oil, but it smelled really bad, and it didn’t dry fast,” she said. With acrylics, “It dries fast, and you can paint over it and redo it.”

She said she’s been mixing elements of nature, like flowers or even people, with nonnatural elements in recent work. She’s attracted by the art of the Impressionists, she said, and by the way that art captures light without being hyper-realistic.
For students who are contemplating college and the future, she recommends, “Follow your passion. … Just do it. Go with what you enjoy the most.”

Reimsnyder, 18, of Belleview has a similar can-do attitude. She said in her family, she evolved into the person who made desserts for when everyone gets together. Her parents are Brad and Jennifer, and her sister is Lauren.

Reimsnyder studied culinary arts at Belleview High School and, since ninth grade, participated in the wedding cake competition of SkillsUSA. As a freshman, she won a silver medal in regional competition and as a junior won a silver in state competition.

She had a neighbor who had a bad accident. He had studied culinary arts at the former Johnson & Wales University’s Miami campus. During the pandemic, the neighbor was without a place to practice his culinary skills, but that’s all he could talk about, she said. He asked her parents if it would be OK to teach her some of his cooking and baking knowledge.

“He lit a spark,” Reimsnyder said. “He showed me the way into the culinary world.”

But the Johnson & Wales Miami campus closed during the pandemic, so Reimsnyder started looking for culinary schools outside of Florida. In the fall, she plans to attend Mississippi University for Women, where she will study culinary arts, focusing on baking and pastries, and business management. She’ll also play on the golf team.

For her senior capstone project at Belleview High, Reimsnyder was required to research her future profession and find a mentor. During a visit to the World Equestrian Center in Ocala when Belleview High students explored career possibilities, she asked the executive pastry chef if he would be her mentor. He not only agreed, but she wound up as a paid intern, doing “kind of everything” at the center’s Emma’s Patisserie, she said.

After college, she said she’s “open to possibilities.” One option might be to start her own business.

Her culinary-oriented neighbor, Nic Bryon, with his brother, Greg, would appear to continue to inspire her. The brothers have opened Pasta Packs in Tampa, a spot serving pasta, offering cooking classes and shipping pasta dishes all over the country.

Reimsnyder said baking and cake decorating helps her explore her creative abilities and avoid monotony. One thing she has been enjoying lately is making animal cakes. A photo of a cow cake she created was one of the items she submitted in her art gallery scholarship application.

Her advice to other students wondering about their futures?

“Be open to anything,” she said. “You never know what direction and path you may follow.”

The Rainbow Springs Art in Dunnellon gallery, at 20826 Walnut St., is open Tuesday through Saturday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. and Sunday, 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.

To learn more, go to rainbowspringsart.com or call (352) 445-8547.