The Magazine

Midwives: The Craft of Birth

  • By: Laura Martínez
Afro women, Chocó. The illustration reads: “The midwife understands with her hands and her heart.”

Midwifery in Indigenous communities in “Colombia” has historically been a practice sustained mainly by women, though not limited to them. “In the past, there wasn’t a specific figure responsible for attending births; rather, it was shared knowledge within the community. The mother, the father, and others close to them knew how to accompany the arrival of life, understanding birth as a collective process rather than an isolated one,” explains a midwife from Colombia’s Andean region.

Over time, this communal capacity has been gradually lost. Factors such as the institutionalization of healthcare, shifts in social dynamics, and a distancing from traditional knowledge have created a disconnection from these practices. In this process, not only has the way births are attended changed, but so has the relationship people have with caring for their own bodies. As Indigenous midwives in the country describe it, a kind of “uninhabiting” has taken place—a gradual forgetting of knowledge that was once part of everyday life.

Afro women, Cauca. The illustration reads: “When I come here and sit with you, I feel that I am reaching my own community—and any community—because this learning is for oneself and for everyone around us. When I accompany a birth at home or alongside doctors, I stay with them. I only step away once the child is born and everything is well.”

However, midwifery has not disappeared. In many territories, especially rural ones, it remains active and is in the process of being reclaimed. More than a purely technical practice, it reflects a way of understanding health across multiple dimensions. Birth rituals, territorial offerings, healing ceremonies, and other associated practices show that supporting childbirth is not limited to the physical or medical, but also integrates spiritual, cultural, and ancestral aspects.

Afro women, Cauca Valley. The illustration reads: “Our work does not end with birth. We continue caring for the life of the child and the mother.”

These illustrations emerge from that context. They aim to represent midwifery not only as a practice of attending birth, but also as a broader system of care, connected to territory and to the ways of life of communities. They also seek to reflect the tension between loss and forgetting, and recovery and resistance, showing how these forms of knowledge remain alive, even as they continue to evolve.

In that sense, rather than offering a nostalgic perspective, the intention is to recognize midwifery as a living practice, one that continues to be shaped by the experiences and knowledge of those who sustain it today.

La Ombligada de Palenque, San Basilio de Palenque. The illustration reads: “During the first days of life, the umbilical cord is carefully watched over. Later, it is buried alongside a seed or beneath a tree, symbolizing a vital connection. The plant that grows becomes a reminder: “there lies that person’s umbilical cord,” reinforcing the roots between the individual and their territory.”

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About the Author

Laura Martínez was born and raised in the Colombian Caribbean and identifies herself as a sentimental artist. Her work stands as a political bet, where social criticism and protest art are the pillars on which she builds her narrative. Laura firmly believes in the transformative power of art and in each individual’s capacity to contribute to social change. She has a clear commitment to what she loves and believes in, and therefore trusts in the construction (for many utopian) of a better future. “The social function of the artist is to provoke and encourage humanity, that’s why I decided from full awareness that my task in this world is to CREATE instead of answering.”