[light music] - [Narrator] At the southern end of the parkway, a generation's old tradition carries on.

Inside Qualla Arts and Crafts Mutual, artists from the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians continue practices that stretch back generations.

Here, every piece carries more than a craft.

It tells a story.

- And most of these artists have had families that have taught them this work as they grew up.

So they're continuing a family tradition as well as preserving and perpetuating a traditional art form and life form that we have used for thousands of years.

I've been blessed in that I've been exposed to artists and people in the community that have nurtured me and gave me advice.

[light music continues] The best advice has been some criticism at times, but it was lessons well learned coming from people that I respected and admired.

[light music continues] - [Narrator] It's an important cultural connection you can see in motion, touch, and feel, an opportunity to learn and to take those lessons home.

- [Davy] In our pottery and in our wood carvings, we're representing these stories and our metaphors.

So they're relating to the legends that taught lessons to our children.

The artwork is a direct connection to the past, to thousands and thousands of years of culture.

[light music continues] There's only 16,000 Eastern Cherokee.

Only a fraction of those are artists.

So to buy a piece of Cherokee artwork is preserving a way of life.

We're still speaking our language.

We're eating traditional foods.

And so the culture is still strong, and we're endeavoring to persevere.

[light music fades]