Beautywood Books and Parlor Pink hosted “Our Stories Are Ceremony: Art as Ancestral Witness” Thursday evening at the latter’s art space in Little Rock, where local artists of color displayed pieces that highlighted the importance of identity, resistance and memory.

The event doubled as a ceremony, asking attendees to reflect on art as not just personal expression, but also as memory that is passed on through generations.

The meeting started with staff from Beautywood, a used bookstore in North Little Rock that is also a community gathering place, lighting candles to mark the opening of the ceremony.

A land acknowledgement was then read that honored the original people of Arkansas and Little Rock — the Quapaw, Osage and Caddo and later the Chickasaw, Choctaw and Cherokee, who were for

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