The Swiss art association Femme Artist Table (FATart) is offering the Wikipedia community a new joint meeting and editing space in Schaffhausen starting from June 2023. Located on the 4th floor of the “Kammgarn West” district, this space organizes year-round activities with an exhibition program specifically dedicated to female artists. It offers ample space for discussions, women’s host workshops, coworking and a café-bar service. Wikipedia authors can meet there over the coming year to make researches, edit, network and exchange experiences. The aim of this innovative space is above all to contribute to more female representation on Wikipedia and its sister projects.

The initiator of this institution is the artist and FATart co-founder Ursina Gabriela Roesch. Her association aims to ensure equal rights for women in society, especially in the arts. “As FATart, we are committed to the visibility, recognition and appreciation of women in the art world, which is still dominated by men,” says Ursina Roesch.

Because women* are still strongly underrepresented in the knowledge world of Wikipedia, the most important online encyclopedia of our time, FATart’s project also includes a space where Wikipedians* can meet to exchange knowledge with artists* and art experts* and jointly elicit and close knowledge gaps about women*. “Wikipedia makes knowledge accessible, and with this collaboration we want many new pages to be written about people”, comments Swassthi Sarma to explain FATart’s commitment in this area as well.

“Thanks to FATart’s initiative, we are moving as a partner into a structure that offers public awareness, contact with the cultural world, and a temporary workplace for our community – a first for the Swiss community,” emphasizes Ulrich Lantermann, Community Manager for German-speaking Switzerland at Wikimedia CH. Now it is up to the community to recognize and actively use this opportunity.

The partnership between Wikimedia CH and FATart came about through GLAM lead Sandra Becker. As an artist, she exhibited several times at the FATart fair and invited the lead Ursina Roesch to the GLAM-on-Tour at the Montreux Jazz Archive in November 2022. This enabled them to intensify their relations and give shape to their cooperation.

Since 2016, the Swiss art association Femme Artist Table (FATart) has been committed to the fair and contemporary inclusion of women as well as lesbian, intersex, non-binary, trans and agender (FLINTA) people in the art world.

FATart explains: “*The gender asterisk (*) serves as a reference to the social construct of ‘gender’. The asterisk after ‘women’ is intended to clarify that it refers to all persons who define themselves, are defined, or are visually perceived as ‘women’.”

 

Update of 5 September:

Opening event on 2 September

The foundation for a growing Wikipedia community in and around Schaffhausen has been laid on 2 September 2023. The first Wikipedia workshop in the new meeting place in Kammgarn West took place in the rooms of the art association FATart. Current and aspiring Wikipedians as well as interested people met with FATart members and Wikimedia CH staff for the opening aperitif and an exchange of experiences. The room is now available for persons who want to be active on Wikipedia and other Wiki projects.


Contact persons* for questions: