Photographer Johanna Alarcón has won the Marilyn Stafford FotoReportage Award 2026 for documenting Indigenous midwifery centers in the Ecuadorian Amazon and Andes.
Featured Photo: Maria Tapuy, a midwife with AMUPAKIN (Association of Kichwa Women Midwives of the Upper Napo), massages the belly of Violeta Tapuy (32), who is expecting their sixth child, to help reposition the baby. (Image credit: Johanna Alarcón)
A Major Award for Indigenous Maternal Healthcare
An Ecuadorian photographer has been named the recipient of the 2026 Marilyn Stafford FotoReportage Award for a series documenting Indigenous maternal healthcare in the country’s Amazonian and Andean regions.
When the Earth Gives Birth tells the story of AMUPAKIN and Partera de Anaku, the first Indigenous midwifery schools and hospitals in the Amazon and Andes.
Told through the perspectives of midwives, apprentices, and patients, the series highlights women-led initiatives that have provided obstetric care for more than thirty years in a region where Indigenous women face disproportionately high maternal mortality.
Johanna Alarcón and When the Earth Gives Birth
Marilyn Stafford FotoReportage Award 2026 winner Johanna Alarcón (Image credit: Johanna Alarcón)
Johanna Alarcón is the photojournalist behind the project. A Magnum Foundation member and recipient of numerous photography accolades, Alarcón’s work explores collective memory, spirituality, and the relationship between community and territory across Latin America.
“I receive this award with the deep joy of knowing that what I love most co-exists - photography, motherhood, and spirituality - coming together in this project to give birth to an intimate story about the work of women and Indigenous peoples to sustain life in a context that destroys it,” she said.
Inside the Award-Winning Series
Olga Chungo: Midwifery and Medicinal Knowledge
Olga Chungo, an Amazonian midwife and member of AMAPUKIN, prepares guayusa (an Amazonian medicinal plant) in the kitchen of her home while waiting for a patient to visit for a prenatal check-up. “For me, being a midwife means taking care of pregnant mothers,” says Olga, “knowing about medicinal plants for childbirth and prenatal control to give life.” / Archidona, Ecuador. August 2022. (Image credit: Johanna Alarcón)
Community Prenatal Care in Sinchiwarmi
Olga Chungo and Ofelia Salazar, AMUPAKIN midwives, conduct a community prenatal check-up visit to pregnant women in the Kichwa Amazonian Sinchiwarmi community. Comprehensive intercultural maternal healthcare includes prenatal care, delivery, and postpartum. The check-ups performed by the midwives include visits to women’s homes as well as appointments at the traditional midwifery hospital. Napo, Ecuador. August 2022. (Image credit: Johanna Alarcón)
Edith Yumbo: Access to Maternal Healthcare
Edith Yumbo (34) waits for prenatal care from the midwife at their home in the community of Santa Rita. Six months pregnant with their fifth baby, Edith has never had a medical check-up because of the distance from the community and the limited resources required to travel to the hospital. Free community visits by midwives are fundamental to maternal health for Indigenous women in the region. Archidona, Ecuador. August 2022. (Image credit: Johanna Alarcón)
About the Marilyn Stafford FotoReportage Award
The Marilyn Stafford FotoReportage Award is an annual competition. Named after Marilyn Stafford, a renowned 20th-century US photojournalist, and facilitated by FotoDocument, an arts social enterprise, it celebrates professional female photographers documenting social, environmental, economic, or cultural issues.
Alarcón received the £4,000 (approximately $5,300 / AU$7,700) award and will gain wider recognition for the winning series. For more information about the award, and to see this year’s shortlist from which When the Earth Gives Birth was selected, visit the Marilyn Stafford Photography website.