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1. A WORD AT THE ONSET OF THE VOYAGE

Each And Every One of Us Was Born

A birth is the result of a creative act and as diverse as humankind.Birth culture is about a society’s handling of the very first phase of a new life and the meaning attributed to it. It signifies the attitude towards human life and nature, our approach to science and spirituality. Furthermore, we direct the attention towards the body of women, the position of families and the genders as well as the design of social coexistence.
Our exhibition lends all aspects related to birth greater visibility. It combines historic objects and contemporary narratives with works of art enhancing one’s experience. We provide basic knowledge, reflect modern developments and examine idealisation and mystification.

2. PLACENTA AND UMBILICAL CORD

A Project of Many Voices

Preparing the exhibition, we invited experts and interested individuals, to join us in brainstorming sessions on birth culture. In September 2019, we received valuable input from around fifty professionals and cooperation partners during a workshop at Hotel Schwärzler in Bregenz. In November 2019, seventy people from all ages and walks of life answered the questions below in the course of an “Open Space”.
How would we like our children to be born?
What is important to us?
What do we consider essential for the time before, during and after giving birth?
Examining the expertise, personal stories as well as wishes and problem areas raised to the surface by the lively discussion are our project’s so-to-speak placenta and umbilical cord. We would like to give thanks to our co-thinkers and those who enabled us to translate this enterprise into action.

3. MUCH MORE THAN JUST BIOLOGY

A Woman’s* Body

The female body prepares itself for giving birth. It starts doing so a long time before we realize. The female foetus – still in its mother’s womb – is carrying already seven million oocytes, at birth there are still one to two million and at the beginning of puberty there are 200,000 left after all.
However, being a woman is much more. We are born a woman or we decide to be one. Along with “the package”, though, come the associated role models, expectations, stereotypes, not to mention our own perception of identity, which also plays an important role in this. In times of pregnancy, birth or parenthood in particular, we are distinctly aware of our own gender. The range of choices and room for action increases, the more knowledge we gain and the better
informed we are about our body.
*When using the term „woman“ (German = Frau) Frauenmuseum Hittisau is fully aware
of the fact that it is dealing with a construction, used to uphold social standards. Female
denominations include all physical persons, who society has classified as such or who think so themselves.

4. ZOUNDS! PINCHES AND PAINS

Pregnancy is Happening

You may feel pinches and tweaks in your abdomen, menstruation has stopped and all you want to do is sleeping. A child is formed.
During the first weeks of pregnancy the mother-to-be’s body is running at full speed with general metabolism increased by 20 percent, blood plasma by 30 to 40 and cardiac output by 40 percent – in a sense, it is a top performance.
Nearly 40 weeks the child grows and thrives according to an internal logic in its mother’s womb, the blueprint rooted into the cells. The unborn child will soon be able to not only taste, hear and see (to a limited extent), it senses what its mother feels and responds to her heartbeat. A miracle takes its course.

5. NEW ROLES

Becoming Parents

With parenthood we take on unfamiliar roles. We are asked to provide the foundation for a new creature. That are big shoes to fill.
As each of us has her/his/their own personal stories, we cannot start from square one, when mothering or fathering our children. Who we are and what we have seen is going to influence our experience of becoming parents, of the pregnancy and the birth.
It can be a time of insecurity and worries just as much as it may bring joy and reassurance. It is up to us to make the decisions how we wish to shape it. It does take courage and we are glad about good support.

6. BIRTH MOVES

The Essence of Birth

Giving birth is an extraordinary event: deeply moving, transcendental, shocking, lasting. Birth is setting the course: The way a woman experiences delivering her child, is crucial for her being well or unwell afterwards.
Each woman’s experience is different. Having contractions does not necessarily mean suffering pain. It might allow a woman just to feel her body doing its work. Considering this, the circumstances are of decisive importance.
Birth is a creative act, where a woman turns her innermost outwards. Everything pivots on emotional security, trust, dedication. To enable the woman in labour to open up, “surrender” to the process of giving birth and deliver her child into the world, she must above all feel safe.

7. TIMES OF ENDEARMENT

Childbed

Childbed or puerperal is a time dedicated to transition and adaptation to the novel situation in life. For new parents as much as the newborn, mother and child want to be nourished, pampered and cared for.
Sustaining the mind is just as important as taking good care of the body: snuggling, smooching, hugging are the order of the day. Close physical contact is a wise investment into the future with the bonding continuing and enhancing the relationship with the child which begun nine months ago when the baby was still inside its mother’s womb.
What about the partner and the personal environment? Active support is what is called for now.

8. LADY’S MANTLE AND SHEPHERD’S PURSE

Officinal Plants in Midwifing

Since ages humans have known that a lot of the food we ingest has medicinal properties and have used plants for healing. They were well aware that the dose administered decides between medicine or poison. Flora offered an almost endless reservoir of remedies. In pregnancy and midwifing officinal plants did play a particularly important role.
There is a cure for everything, whether a woman wishes to become pregnant or rather prevent it, whether she needs help with pregnancy complaints, premature labour must be suppressed or the delivery eased, whether for regeneration or to support the body’s return to its pre-pregnancy state and even for baby care
there are substances.
Much knowledge has been lost, but is rediscovered these days and utilized in holistic treatment concepts.

9. THE ART OF GIVING SUPPORT

One-to-one: Second to None

Supporting someone requires profound understanding of the human condition and all processes involved in birth. Assistance must be delivered respectfully and in a mindful way. Caring for someone means not to judge but have the other’s back and give her space. Interventions are used only in case of emergencies. Assistance is about allowing the birth to progress at its own pace or the art of restraint.
Scientific evidence confirms that one-to-one-support of women in labour by a midwife reduces the rate of complications, Caesarean sections, and epidurals. Overall, the mother is more satisfied with her birth experience.
It confirms also that the number of fatalities worldwide in both mothers and children is reduced by more than three-quarters if good support is provided.

10. BIRTH IS CHANGING

Lack and Oversupply

Through millennia, birth has been treated as an ordinary and natural process, attended by experienced midwifes. Women gave birth among women. Aspects of a cultural or social nature took priority.
With modern obstetrics becoming established, the mortality rate of mother and child decreased. At the same time technologization was “sneaking in”. Under the pretext of safety an ever-growing number of births was transferred from the domestic environment into hospitals.
Today there is a huge global gap between a lack in medical care on the one hand and oversupply on the other. Caesarean section rates and the number of interventions have arrived at an alarming extent in the industrialized parts of our world.
According to UNICEF (United Nations Children’s Fund) and WHO (World Health Organization), child and maternal mortality rates are declining worldwide. Nevertheless, a woman or newborn baby still dies every eleven seconds – often due to a lack of infra-structure and care.

11. GIVING BIRTH IN THIS DAY AND AGE

Potential, Limitations, Challenges

Obstetrics has been significantly medicalised in the past decades even if there have been voices speaking up for gentle(r) methods. British gynaecologist Grantly Dick-Read is considered a pioneer
of “natural birth”. At the end of the 1970s Frenchmen Frédérick
Leboyer coined the term “birth without violence”.
Today, we have arrived at a paradoxical situation: Despite excellent medical care and refined medical techniques, birth has sometimes become a subject laden with fear and the confidence in women’s ability to deliver a child seems to be decreasing. Global crises also have a major impact: COVID-19 has separated couples at birth and in the puerperium and ties up resources of health care systems. Pregnant women, mothers and new-born
babies are fleeing from conflict areas. In the USA for instance, it has been shown that structural racism makes it three times more likely to die from childbirth.

12. EVERYTHING’S UNDER CONTROL?

Birth and Safety

Epidural, Caesarean section, pharmacological induction of labour, monitoring the baby’s heartbeat, all these achievements may be warranted, albeit many women are reacting against birth being instrumentalised.
Recent scientific research backs the return to old knowledge of midwifes or women, an approach not intended as a contradiction to progress and emergency medicine. The WHO has been recommending one-to-one care for pregnant women to be provided by midwifes pre-birth, during labour and afterwards since 2018.
We will find fruitful multi-disciplinary cooperation particularly where there is mutual appreciation and recognition. Obstetrics may have optimised its methods, but it has hit a wall now. Relation-guided obstetrics, however, draws attention to personal resources and focuses on the woman giving birth.

13. CAESAREAN SECTION

A Delicate Subject

By Roman writer Pliny the Elder (23–79 AC) we are told that Caesar was cut from his mother’s belly. It is said that he was in fact named after Latin “caesus” meaning cut. Today, the Caesarean section is the most common surgery performed on women of childbearing age.
Since decades the figures keep rising in industrialized as well as emerging countries. At present the global C-section rate is at 21 percent, increasing by 4 percent each year. While only 5 percent of women have C-section births in southern Africa, it is 60 percent in Latin America.
A caesarian effectively saves lives if medically indicated. However, if the rate exceeds a certain percentage, there is no indication the mortality rate declines any further. There is hardly another topic as controversial in contemporary obstetrics as the number of medically justified C-sections.

14. SOLELY WOMEN’S BUSINESS?

Men and Birth

There are several reasons emphasising that birth is not solely a woman’s matter. For one, every man has been inside a woman’s belly once and thus took part in at least one birth. An experience, that leaves an imprint and must be confronted again by men, when their child comes into the world.
The quality of every relationship a man has is informed by his ability to handle birth. Today a good many men are looking for positive role models, permitting them to grow into loving and responsible partners and fathers.
The man’s role during birth: He is witness and attentive companion. Actively responding to his own and his wife’s/partner’s needs.

15. TEST TUBE BABIES

What Reproductive Medicine Has on Offer

The standard reproductive medicine has achieved so far is high and the global market continues to grow. In Austria alone, we find more than thirty fertility clinics, with two of them located in
Vorarlberg.*
The very first Austrian baby conceived by in vitro fertilization was born in Vienna in 1982. Today there are 3500 born every year. Meanwhile, the possibilities available have expanded to hormonal stimulation, artificial insemination, IVF (In Vitro Fertilisation) or ICSI (Intracytoplasmic Sperm Injection), amongst others.
The donation of sperm or eggs is regulated by law.
Austria allows social egg freezing, i.e. harvesting and freezing egg cells for later use, only in exceptional circumstances. Surrogacy, however, where a woman bears a child for another person, who raises the child, remains forbidden in this country.
*Quelle/Source: Österr. IVF Gesellschaft (Austrian IVF Association)

16. VORARLBERG’S MATERNITY HOMES

An Exceptional Position

Thanks to its maternity homes Vorarlberg, which indeed once boasted one in nearly every larger community, occupies a special position in this country. Midwife Ottilia Schwendinger opened the first maternity home in 1910 in her own house in Dornbirn.
In 1973 Vorarlberg had 27 maternity homes, which have been closed gradually since then. Many women preferred to give birth at a hospital. The number of nuns, previously providing care almost for free, was in decline and the additional staff employed was expensive. Furthermore, the community physician’s liability risk had grown too much to handle.
Following decades of debate between the community, federal state and the general public, the doors of the province’s last lying-in home in Lustenau were shut in 2001.
Today there are birth houses or midwife practices with obstetrics in all Austrian federal states apart from Vorarlberg and Burgenland.

17. ONE BIRTH IS NOT LIKE ANOTHER

Politics and Social Framework

One of the factors influencing the way a baby enters this world is the health care its native country provides.
It is not the parties concerned who decide about the nature of the prenatal medical care, obstetrics or midwifery and after-care offered, but it is for politics to determine.
Swedes favour having the birth take place at a hospital. Midwifes are the first contact here with the income levels of midwifes and doctors on an equal level. Homebirth is encouraged by the state in the Netherlands, where women are tended to by a maternity care assistant, a profession singular to that country.
98 percent of all children born in Austria are delivered in a hospital. Staff shortages and stressful working conditions are increasing. Contracts with public health insurers are unattractive to freelance midwifes. Vorarlberg has merely one midwife left who does home births.

18. TODAY A RARITY WHAT WAS ONCE COMMON PRACTICE

Home Birth in Vorarlberg

Until well into the 20th century, giving birth at home was the custom in rural regions of Austria. You would have found a village midwife in almost every community, who would service neighbouring areas as well. Some midwifes even installed lying-in rooms in their own homes or founded maternity homes, particularly in Vorarlberg.
In 2019 only 28 of 4326 children were delivered at home in Vorarlberg. The dramatic decline in home births is attributed to the medical and technical infrastructure provided by hospitals, the increased mobility of mothers-to-be and the state’s subsidisation of hospital births. Moreover, home birth lost appeal for midwifes due to the precarious working conditions involved. Nonetheless, the demand has begun to rise again recently.

19. THE BIRTHING MOTHER AND THE UNIVERSE

Symbol of Growth and Regeneration

Since the beginning of time, the woman as birthing mother has been related to the universe. She was regarded as a symbol of growth and regeneration in nature. Embodying the archetype of procreation gave her a special status.
30,000 years ago the Aborigines created the first depiction of a birth at Nourlangie. In South Italian Ostuni the 28,000 year old skeleton of a pregnant woman protecting her belly with her arm was discovered.
Until the Neolithic Age people were ignorant of the man’s part in reproduction. The development of the patriarchy increasingly drove women from their primacy in society.

20. FROM A MATTER OF FACT TO A FIELD OF CONFLICT

Men and Women in Healing

For a long time male and female healers have been treated on par. In the Early Middle Ages monks and nuns both acted as healers and you would have found women practicing medicine in many places. The School of Salerno for instance, where gynaecologist Trotula taught, became famous in 9th century Sicily.
Obstetrics and gynaecology used to be solely in the hands of women for a long time, with woman surgeons and pharmacists knowledgeable in herbalism, wise women and especially midwifes playing a central role.
In the 12th century the first universities were founded. The study of medicine became a privilege of male gentry or clergy. It was to remain so for a very long time. However, medical studies in their early stages did not bring any tangible progress as curricula revolved around erroneous ancient concepts. For that reason, folk
medicine continued to be hugely popular with the public.

21. THE FULL RANGE

Mother Nature, Control, and Practicality

Since the Middle Ages obstetrics and gynaecology began turning more and more into a male preserve. As a consequence the woman’s role as a mother, birth control, contraception and abortion became subject to ideological purposes.
The information recorded regarding pregnancies and births which went smoothly is poor. It is known though that until the 20th century five to seven percent of all children delivered was
stillborn or not viable.
The increased technologisation of birth has moved deliveries from private homes into hospitals. Genetic engineering and reproduction technologies deceive us into thinking that anything is possible and manageable.

22. UMBILICAL CORDS POUCHES, FIRE BEDS AND EVIL SPIRITS

Birth Rituals from all Over the World

Pregnancy and birth might follow a different pattern in other countries. There are various ways of rituals to give importance to and celebrate this exceptional time. Rituals connect and convey the feeling of security and want to bring good luck and health to mother and child. North Cameroon’s Mafa bury the placenta in a calabash, because they consider it to be the “little sister” of the newborn.
In Laos a fire bed is prepared for mother and child to keep them warm after the delivery and make them feel cared for and sheltered. In Senegal, however, a knife, three spools and an ear are fastened to the newborn’s bed to keep evil spirits away. Native Americans will carry their umbilical cord made into animal shaped small bags on them a lifetime, while Brazil’s Karajá create small clay figures as symbols of fertility, femaleness and motherhood.

23. MIDWIFE STONES AND DESERT-ROSES

Alpine Birth Customs

The birth of a new member into a family or rural community was a meaningful event emphasized by various rituals and customs relevant for a community’s social cohesion. Alpine traditions and Christian worldview often go hand in hand. After all, Christianity centres around a child being born.
Delivering women were given rosaries with pendants from Malachite, the so-called midwife stone. Small glass vials with reliquaries allegedly eased the pain during childbirth. When a woman went into labour, some would put a rose of Jericho into a bowl with water: The quicker “St. Mary’s flower” would blossom, the easier the birth was believed to proceed. Giving birth was dangerous and had death lurking in the background every time. Sometimes the delivering women would wear a “Fraisenhaube” to prevent the child from coming to any harm if the mother should have a scare during the birth.

24. BORN INTO A FAITH COMMUNITY

World Religions & Initiation Ceremonies

All world religions are anxious to receive the newborn baby into its religious community instantly. The children of Jewish mothers automatically belong to Judaism, quasi inheriting their religion. Jewish boys are circumcised when they are eight days old with circumcision a sign of the Jews’ covenant with God. Muslims also believe that every child belongs to their faith through birth and practice male circumcision, too.
Christians celebrate receiving a new member into their community with God through baptism, usually soon after the child was born. Buddhists welcome the newborn with a reception ceremony, while Hinduist babies are written the syllable “Om” on their tongues with a feather dipped in honey. Mother and child are washed with water of the River Ganges.

25. GODLINESS AND AQUIESCENCE

Offerings – Expressing Thanks

In times past, pregnant women were as a German expression signifies “of good hope”. Belief, godliness and acquiescence figured prominently in peoples’ lives, especially at critical life events.
Up to the twentieth century birth and death were closely connected. Infant and maternal mortality was very high. To ward off bad luck from both, mother and unborn child, the woman in labour wore amulets and protective necklaces (“Fraisenketten”).
When a healthy child had been delivered and the mother was fit and well, votive panels were donated to give thanks. But even if newborns should die one after another, this could not harm the trust in God.

26. DIGITIZATION AND BIRTH

Babies Stressed by Mobile Phones

Digital life style does not stop when it comes to pregnancy, giving birth or parenting. The electronic industry has understood the market’s potential and continues to launch new products.
There are apps for the menstruation cycle, pregnancy, embryonic development, finding a name for your baby, on breastfeeding or fathers. Some read the meaning of your baby’s crying and tell the parents whether it is hungry, thirsty or has other needs.
Mobile phones in the delivery room have become a problem in our days because a birth requires full concentration and newborns need undivided attention. The effect of the omnipresent digital media on the parent-child relationship is of growing interest for the field of attachment research.

27. SOCIAL POLICY AND AUTHORITY

Birth Culture – Pawn of Ideologies

Existing power relations, political decisions and structural conditions are affecting all spheres of life, including birth. It says a lot about a society whether this very first phase of life is given priority, how a society sets the stage and which images it creates.
The history of birth is the history of women, of humankind and part of our cultural history. We are faced with traditional values, hierarchical role models, belief systems and dogmas. There are ethical questions regarding
conception, pregnancy, birth and future children.

28. GIVING BIRTH: WANT AND WEIGHT

To What Extent Are Women Autonomous in Decision-Making?

What does women’s self-determination related to pregnancy and birth involve? What is the impact of social status or social conditions? This is about the right to choose, the right to know and the right to decide, what happens to one’s body.
The issues are complex. The spectrum of positions can be huge, as for instance when it comes to the possibilities offered by modern reproduction technologies. They are extending women’s self-determination by making them independent of biology’s limits for some, others consider them as abridging the very same while some consider it a moral question, if women ought to make their body available to fulfill someone else’s wish to have children.
Also, prenatal examinations might cause a situation of conflict.
The weight of expectation is high, but is it indeed a woman’s “duty” to give birth only to a healthy child? Where are the limits to freedom for someone, wanting to take another path?

29. IN THE BEGINNING THERE WAS

Where Do We Come From? How Was the Earth Formed?

There are as many answers to these questions as there are cultures in the world. Often, the world’s beginning is characterised by huge expanses of water, eternal darkness or an immortal being. The first human being is central to some African peoples. The Tibetans have the concept of five life essences while in China everything originated from chaos.
Native Americans tell of the spider woman, who weaved the universe, of a raven who brought the light into the world or goddess Atahensic, giving birth to Mother Earth. The Incas believe sun god and moon goddess created the earth.
The myth saying God made man out of clay or dust is shared by Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Creation myths reflect the power structures and role models a society is based upon.

30. A LIKELY STORY!

Faith and Superstition

Many things our ancestors considered solid knowledge, are viewed as superstition today. The church, religion and faith exerted a dominant influence. Superstition helped understanding the regularities behind the world’s phenomena. Some of these beliefs were written down, much was passed on orally.
Natural magic interpreted nature’s signs as a hint for future events. The Christian canon of values believes in the idea of “white” and “black” magic. Pregnancy and birth have always been fertile ground for projections. The German term “Ammenmärchen” [Amme = wet nurse] refers to a custom in previous times when wet nurses loved to entertain their charges with incredible stories. To this day, these “fairy tales” are evidence of a superstitious worldview.

31. BABY MACHINES FOR NAZI GERMANY

Mothers Serving the National Socialist Ideology

Immediately after the First World War, the birth rate rose noticeably. But after 1920, because of the economic situation started to sink drastically again. In 1933, the National Socialist terror regime launched political and financial measures in order to accelerate the birth numbers. Nazi ideology elevated the status of mothers. “With each child a mother bears this nation, she fights her battle for the nation”, Adolf Hitler wrote. “Just as the man stands up for the nation, the woman does for the family”. But don’t be misled, this is not about gender equality. A woman’s role was reduced to bearing children. She was responsible for the “breeding the Aryan race” in the
“battle of births”. “Eternal mothers” were Arian-only, “hereditary healthy” and “racially valuable”. People with disabilities, who were mentally ill and “antisocial” were forced to undergo sterilisation. From the logic of National Socialist “racial hygiene”, the “unworthy of reproduction” was to be eradicated.

32. ANYTHING BUT SPONTANEOUS

Birth in the Media

The media have become an important part of everyday culture and communication. For pregnant women the internet provides a platform for information, networking, advertising or discussion with YouTube as the trendy forum for publishing birth experiences.
Usually movie births are fast, dramatic, fragmented and stereotypical. First and foremost you will see faces contorted with pain, people frantically urging mother to PUSH. Reality TV loves dramatically enacting imminent danger to justify surgical intervention.
In both, feature and TV films, realistic portrayals of an ordinary delivery are rare. Invariably, however, is the joy of maternity turned on at the flick of a switch and considered a given, no matter what.

33. FUTURE BABIES

How Far Are We Willing to Go?

Genetic engineering and reproduction technologies provide a wide range of options. On the one hand they allow eliminating genetic defects while on the other they have raised the spectre of the designer baby. Already today, a sperm or egg donor’s features like the colour of eyes or hair, education, profession and character traits are registered and placed at the disposal of the sperm or egg bank user. The global surrogacy market is booming. In the Netherlands tests are run with artificial uteruses. The psychological impact of these configurations has not yet been studied. The facts: How many “mothers” and “fathers” may be involved in making a baby today?
Egg donor
Sperm donor
Reproductive physician
Uterus donor
Surrogate mother
Social parents bringing up the child

34. WOMEN’S RIGHTS ARE HUMAN RIGHTS

Where There’s a Will, There’s a Way

Sexuality, pregnancy, birth and parenthood come with rights. Nations are obliged to implement these and make sure they are observed. Unfortunately though, basic human rights are neglected in many countries. In places with a lack of health care, women are often less educated. They cannot make their own decisions about their sexuality, suffer discrimination and fall victim to violence.
Even if in case of oversupply of health care, rights are disregarded, only in a different way: High rates of intervention have led to initiatives against violence in birth assistance. This activism can be recognised around the world, with free choice of where to deliver one’s baby, self-determination, medical care, physical integrity, and the right not to know as well as one-to-one assistance as its key factors.

35. WORLD IN MOTION

Global Campaigns

Numerous forceful initiatives worldwide have taken up the cause of women’s and children’s rights. Naturally, pregnancy and birth both feature prominently in their efforts, with dramatic figures enjoining on us the urgency of these campaigns.
In India or China a girl’s right to live still has to be protected. Elsewhere, access to medical care comes down to a life and death decision about the survival of mother and child. #MeToo demands the right to physical integrity, but pushing or crossing boundaries is indeed an issue in birth assistance, too.
Today, many women dare breaking the silence. In Hungary women have won the right to freedom of choice between home and hospital birth.
“Give Birth Like a Feminist” stands for autonomy in the birth process, demonstrating that women’s rights are advancing gradually into areas considered taboo down to the present day.

36. BIRTH – SETTING THE COURSE

From Status Quo to State of the Art

A vision is the idea of a condition or state of affairs we are aiming to achieve. A mindful and progressive birth culture wishes to improve the standard of care for mothers and families worldwide.The focus is on relation-guided, holistic obstetrics. Thus providing effective preventive care and contributing to the advancement of
society on all levels.
All over the world, there are initiatives and models showing the way. Appreciation, acknowledgement and political intent are indispensable for creating the best conditions for mothers, families, children and the experts assisting them. From the idea to reality, a vision coming true.
Our “Room for Birth and Senses” is a true part of this vision.

37. BIRTH CULTURE A-Z

From Mindful to Up-to-Date

The “IG Geburtskultur a-z” [Interest Group Birth Culture] was founded in 2016. It promotes a holistic and health-enhancing birth culture in Vorarlberg and looks at human birth and the circumstances and expertise required with a comprehensive and culture-focused approach.
In order to allow pregnancy and birth as natural events in life to be experienced as safe, free of fear, and empowering, IG seeks to place them at the very centre of our society. Thereby laying the foundation for health, a successful life and good relationships. IG’s vision includes the choice between different options, one-to-one-assignment, midwife-centred ante- and post-natal care, multidisciplinary support and the de-economisation of obstetrics.
Mitglieder / Members: Anka Dür (Architektin, Hebamme i.A. / architect, midwife in training), Hannah Gabriel (Hebamme i.A. / midwife in training), Natalie Gmeiner (Psychologin / psychologist), Birgit Kalb (Traumatherapeutin / trauma counsellor), Angela Schiemer (Kinder- und Jugendpsychiaterin / child and youth psychiatrist), Andrea Schwarz (Hebamme / midwife), Brigitta Soraperra (Kulturarbeiterin / cultural worker)
Nicht mehr aktive Gründungsmitglieder / No longer actively involved founding members: Susanne Haunold-Sam (Hebamme / midwife), Heidemarie Körber-Lemp (Gynäkologin & Geburtshelferin / gynaecologist & obstetrician), Daniela Mittermayr-Zech (Pränatal-Psychotherapeutin / prenatal psychotherapist)

38. GIVING BIRTH: FIRST HAND STORIES

Interviews with Contemporary Witnesses

The Women’s Museum Hittisau is not merely a memory space and a room where historical contexts are illustrated, but also a room for dialogue and public discourse. Objects as well as people and their stories bring themes and content aspects to life at this place.
Experience-based knowledge plays a central role when it comes to the subject of birth. Sadly, this is increasingly vanishing into oblivion. Each birth is a unique and formative experience. We create solidarity and encouragement for others – you are not alone in this – if we talk about it, be it happiness or the miraculous adventure, be it sad things or taboos.
Listening improves our understanding of other cultures and foreign practices. The very personal interviews reveal a variety of topics related to a child entering the world.

39. CORE SAMPLES OF A TOPIC

Why Art?

Time and again the subject of birth has inspired creating works of art. The first sculptures known to us are small women statuettes from the Neolithic Age. Many of them are pregnant or giving birth. To examine the issue from different angles, we have chosen different positions in contemporary art. Not to illustrate, but rather as a sort of drilling samples, providing personal statements, new viewpoints and specific perspectives on pregnancy and giving birth. Some artists centre around the process of birth and look at their own personal experience. Works of 1970s feminist avant-garde artists comment on their role as a woman, mother and artist.
This is also resonate with current feminist positions, which revolve around the female body and the connecting elements across the
divide.

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