This past Thursday, Effum Body Works, a local tattoo and piercing shop collaborated with a small Baton Rouge creator, HerCollective, to celebrate Juneteenth.

There were many small business owners as well as poets and young artists.

Ayana Ferguson, host of the Poetry Slam and owner of HerCollective spoke on how she came about hosting this event.

“I haven’t seen many people do poetry events in Baton Rouge… especially females, in the poetry scene. So I wanted to bring that back to not only represent females, but those who feel like they don’t have a voice”, said Ferguson.

Many of these businesses included many things from artwork to jewelry.

With the combination of art and African-American culture, Effum and Ferguson used this event as a platform to highlight and support small artists.

“I wanted to give back to the community and I wanted to have a community based event, where we celebrate black love, art, and freedom; because we don’t have that many places that do that here in Baton Rouge”.