The Harris Center is proud to present an exhibition of new and classic artwork by acclaimed author and illustrator Lynne Cherry, whose 30+ award-winning children’s books — including The Great Kapok Tree and A River Ran Wild — have inspired generations to care for the natural world.

Cherry is also the founder of Young Voices for the Planet, a nonprofit that shares stories of young people taking environmental action — from banning plastic bags to planting trees and helping shut down coal plants — showing what’s possible when youth lead the way.

This exhibit will be on display from August 3 to 31 in the Thelma Babbitt Room, and is available to view during regular business hours. A reception, artist talk, and book signing will be held on Thursday, August 6 from 5 to 6:45 p.m. The artist talk will begin at 5:30 p.m. followed by the book signing. No registration is required. For more information, contact Miles Stahmann.

The Great Kapok Tree by Lynne Cherry (illustration © Lynne Cherry)

Bear sketches (illustration © Lynne Cherry)

About Lynne Cherry

Lynne Cherry is a children’s book author of 30 award-winning children’s books including New York Times best-sellers The Great Kapok Tree and A River Ran Wild. Her books have been staples in school classrooms for decades. Children often perform plays and musicals of The Great Kapok Tree in which a woodcutter enters the forest but falls to sleep. The book has stunning, vibrant and lovingly rendered illustrations of the lush rainforest with its tree porcupines, anteaters, butterflies, insects and other forest creatures.

A River Ran Wild tells the story of a pristine Nashua river when Native Americans lived along its banks and its pollution during the Industrial revolution and, then, its redemption due to one individual, Marion Stoddart, who led the effort to clean the Nashua which now runs clean again.

Lynne is also the producer and director of 13 award-winning Young Voices for the Planet films that champion youth success stories and inspire young people to take action themselves. As an environmental communicator, she has written extensively about youth empowerment and teaching with solutions rather than gloom and doom.

Lynne received a BFA from Tyler School of Art, a BA from Temple University, an MA in history from Yale University and an honorary doctorate from Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico (UNAM). She has had many residencies including at Princeton, Cornell, Smithsonian, and Woods Hole’s marine biology institutes. She was artist-in-residence at the Harris Center in 2024. She is currently artist-in-residence at Earth Commons at Georgetown University in Washington DC. Lynne has received numerous awards, a Metcalf Fellowship and the Brandwein Medal.

She also writes for adults. Her chapter in Written in Water appeared in a National Geographic publication. She has written widely on the importance of exposing children to hopeful success stories when teaching about the environment and an article co-written with renowned Social Scientist Albert Bandura of Stanford University appeared in the journal American Psychologist.

You can hear Lynne reading some of her children’s books on NPR’s Living on Earth here.