It is part of the initiative Women’s Legacy–Emakumeen Emaria, which aspires to be a European platform to integrate a gender perspective in cultural heritage interpretation. Two of its promoters are Ainara Martínez Matía, an art historian, and Aintzane Eguilior Mancisidor, head of cultural heritage dissemination programs at the Diputación Foral de Bizkaia. Since 2018, the Diputación has organized the European Heritage Days, dedicating that year’s event to the legacy of women in the cultural heritage of Bizkaia. This allowed them, explains Eguilior, “to make women visible, and at the same time, to highlight many professions carried out by women that had not been valued.” From there, they decided to promote the project, as Martínez mentions, “being aware that in Europe there were very interesting initiatives to work on the gender perspective.”

Martínez acknowledges that initiatives like Joc de Dames are “an inspiration.” “It has everything. It is a local initiative deeply involved in the territory, appealing to a well-established heritage. And when it seemed there was nothing more to say, they came to raise awareness and to point out that, at the very least, half of the story was still missing.”

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