Hall of Femmes
The midwife’s archives is a book based on the collections of Elsy Salomonsson:
hundreds of brochures, photos and personal notes that she collected, wrote, and kept from her time working as a Swedish midwife in Tunisia in the 1970s.
/
Being a midwife in Tunisia in the 1970s meant being at the center of what was considered to be a key in the shaping of the Modern Tunisian woman, and of the Modern nation: family planning.
Elsy’s collected brochures, clinical material and newspaper cuts, allow us to dive into the discourse and imagery around women’s bodies, sexuality and reproduction, an ideal of the modern family, and how it was represented as the condition for the prosperity and development of the newly independent nation.
/
”It is a unique and intimate perspective. It is one of an outsider, of a young Swedish woman in her mid-thirties, coming to an African Arabic-speaking country for a few years, to support its development within the area of reproductive health, working as a midwife in some of the most remote areas, who doesn’t escape being also an insider, at times. She became a staff member of local healthcare centers, caring for the women and patients, supervising the assistant nurses, attending seminars, planning and doing parts of the daily work. Given her position, she was at the center of how the intimate and the political intertwine.”
Mayssa Rekhis
Samira Bouabana is a Swedish-Tunisian graphic designer, educator, publisher and director. Based in Stockholm, Sweden. Her design practice spans across a wide range of areas: design commissions, self initiated projects, book publishing, lecturing and teaching. Founder of design studio Hjärta Smärta (2001) and design history project Hall of Femmes (2009–), publisher of, so far, ten books about women designers. Between 2014 and 2024 she was a senior lecturer and program director of the Visual communication program at Beckmans College of Design.
Mayssa Rekhis is a Tunisian anthropologist, educator, activist,
writer, and medical doctor, with more than 12 years of professional
and volunteering experience in non-profit, non- and inter-governmental organizations in the fields of health, human rights, and migration in
North Africa, South West Asia, and Europe. Her areas of expertise include Mental Health, Sexual and Reproductive health, and Critical Medical Anthropology. She is currently working as a Global Public Health lecturer at the University of Gothenburg and directing the interdisciplinary Global Health program.
Edith Ekström is a Swedish graphic designer based in Stockholm. She has a BA in graphic design and illustration from Konstfack University and Gerrit Rietveld Academie. Apart from working as an assistant designer to Samira Bouabana, she runs her own practice, focusing on commissions and projects within the cultural field. She also works with self initiated projects, often based on themes connected to publishing, archiving and memory.
LAWEN MOHTADI is a Swedish writer, editor and documentary filmmaker. She is the author of the award winning book The Day I am Free, a biography on the Swedish-Roma writer and activist Katarina Taikon.
She subsequently co-directed the documentary film Taikon, which was released in 2015 and based on her book. Between 2015 and 2021 she was a Senior Editor at the publishing house Natur & Kultur in Stockholm, and is currently a Project Manager at the Swedish History Museum.
hundreds of brochures, photos and personal notes that she collected, wrote, and kept from her time working as a Swedish midwife in Tunisia in the 1970s.
/
Being a midwife in Tunisia in the 1970s meant being at the center of what was considered to be a key in the shaping of the Modern Tunisian woman, and of the Modern nation: family planning.
Elsy’s collected brochures, clinical material and newspaper cuts, allow us to dive into the discourse and imagery around women’s bodies, sexuality and reproduction, an ideal of the modern family, and how it was represented as the condition for the prosperity and development of the newly independent nation.
/
”It is a unique and intimate perspective. It is one of an outsider, of a young Swedish woman in her mid-thirties, coming to an African Arabic-speaking country for a few years, to support its development within the area of reproductive health, working as a midwife in some of the most remote areas, who doesn’t escape being also an insider, at times. She became a staff member of local healthcare centers, caring for the women and patients, supervising the assistant nurses, attending seminars, planning and doing parts of the daily work. Given her position, she was at the center of how the intimate and the political intertwine.”
Mayssa Rekhis
Samira Bouabana is a Swedish-Tunisian graphic designer, educator, publisher and director. Based in Stockholm, Sweden. Her design practice spans across a wide range of areas: design commissions, self initiated projects, book publishing, lecturing and teaching. Founder of design studio Hjärta Smärta (2001) and design history project Hall of Femmes (2009–), publisher of, so far, ten books about women designers. Between 2014 and 2024 she was a senior lecturer and program director of the Visual communication program at Beckmans College of Design.
Mayssa Rekhis is a Tunisian anthropologist, educator, activist,
writer, and medical doctor, with more than 12 years of professional
and volunteering experience in non-profit, non- and inter-governmental organizations in the fields of health, human rights, and migration in
North Africa, South West Asia, and Europe. Her areas of expertise include Mental Health, Sexual and Reproductive health, and Critical Medical Anthropology. She is currently working as a Global Public Health lecturer at the University of Gothenburg and directing the interdisciplinary Global Health program.
Edith Ekström is a Swedish graphic designer based in Stockholm. She has a BA in graphic design and illustration from Konstfack University and Gerrit Rietveld Academie. Apart from working as an assistant designer to Samira Bouabana, she runs her own practice, focusing on commissions and projects within the cultural field. She also works with self initiated projects, often based on themes connected to publishing, archiving and memory.
LAWEN MOHTADI is a Swedish writer, editor and documentary filmmaker. She is the author of the award winning book The Day I am Free, a biography on the Swedish-Roma writer and activist Katarina Taikon.
She subsequently co-directed the documentary film Taikon, which was released in 2015 and based on her book. Between 2015 and 2021 she was a Senior Editor at the publishing house Natur & Kultur in Stockholm, and is currently a Project Manager at the Swedish History Museum.