Tiny creatures on display at North Carolina Arboretum
West Virginia-based illustrator and author Rosalie Haizlett grew up on a rural farm surrounded by creativity and wide-open woods. Her dad was a design professor, and her siblings were always making things: music, films, furniture.
“…I learned from an early age to entertain myself using my imagination, creative tools, and inspiration from the outdoors,” she says.
She never quite stopped. After studying design and illustration in college, Haizlett launched a career as a full-time nature illustrator, completing residencies in national parks and wildlife refuges across the country.
In 2021, during a rare break in her freelance work, she dreamed up a new project: to travel the full length of the Appalachian Mountains and document the tiny creatures and plants she found along the way. That journey became “Tiny Worlds of the Appalachian Mountains,” an illustrated book with 150 original paintings and essays.
Forty of those works are now on display at The North Carolina Arboretum through September, offering a whimsical, richly detailed look at the region’s smallest life forms — mushrooms, mosses, and beyond.
One favorite piece, “Morning in a Mountain Bog,” captures a quiet, almost magical moment in New Hampshire’s White Mountains.
“I hunched down and sat perfectly quiet for many minutes, and as I sank into stillness, a variety of wonderful creatures emerged: bluet damselflies, a muskrat nibbling on plants, and a green frog with shiny gold-flecked eyes that looked like beautiful glass marbles,” says Haizlett. “Around me, bog plants like roundleaf sundew, purple pitcher plant, and sheep laurel created a delightful backdrop.”
Haizlett hopes visitors will leave the exhibit feeling more attuned to the small wonders hiding in plain sight.
“My aim,” she says, “is to encourage each visitor to look more closely at their own surroundings and consider ways that they might interact with our non-human neighbors with deepened awe, respect, and stewardship.”
Tiny Worlds of the Appalachian Mountains: The Watercolor Paintings of Rosalie Haizlett runs through September 7 at The North Carolina Arboretum (100 Frederick Law Olmsted Way, Asheville). See ncarboretum.org.