As the only industrialized nation in the world not to have a federal paid leave policy, where the majority of birth mothers go back to work on average 10 weeks after giving birth, it’s not hard to see how this status quo can have an impact on the health of American mothers as well as their children, especially if they are breastfeeding. Due to the lack of support infrastructure across the United States when it comes to maternal care and postpartum, data shows that although roughly 84% of birth mothers start out wanting to breastfeed their children, they cannot meet their own breastfeeding goals or health recommendations.
While there are a number of recently-postpartum mothers who end up leaving their jobs or the workforce altogether, those who stay and continue to breastfeed often have to contend with less-than-ideal or unconventional environments to keep producing breastmilk at a consistent rate.
To allow more people to visualize this reality and to reiterate the need for more support across the U.S., photographer artist, filmmaker and mother Corinne May Botz embarked on an eye-opening and thought-provoking photo series called ‘Milk Factory’, which she turned into a book that is available now through Saint Lucy Books.
‘Milk Factory’ is the first visual study of America’s lactation rooms. Photographing spaces where mothers pump – a prison, corporate offices, farm laborer’s tent, schools, an airport, and the U.S. Capitol – Corinne exposes the hidden architecture of care. The project examines the economic, legal, and emotional realities of contemporary parenthood in a society that treats care as private responsibility rather than public infrastructure.
The photographs reveal what being a parent looks like in a late-capitalist society that values productivity over health and attachments. They make visible the contradiction between nurture and efficiency, and the ways in which care work is sequestered from public life. It is also a stark reminder that regardless of the economic status of the breastfeeding person, this lack of infrastructure and support extends across the financial spectrum.
Along with essays by writer and curator Hettie Judah and legal scholar Mathilde Cohen, ‘Milk Factory‘ also includes first-hand testimonies of pumping experiences from women across the United States. The stories range from a nurse who pumped during the New York City Marathon, to a prison doula helping incarcerated mothers stay connected to their infants, to a police officer who was driven to the point of breakdown trying to pump milk in a hostile work environment.
The narratives demonstrate how lived experience becomes political evidence. We spoke with Corinne about her images, drawing from her own experience, and the undeniably powerful messages ‘Milk Factory’ shares.
When did you begin working on ‘Milk Factory’, and decide to make this into a book?
‘Milk Factory’ began as a personal record of my early experience as a mother. Shortly after giving birth to my daughter, I photographed the oddly sparse room where I pumped at work. A few years later, in 2018, I realized how that image connected to my broader practice as an exploration of women’s experiences and space.
I decided to create an unconventional portrait of motherhood through lactation rooms. In 2021, I released a short film of the same name, made in a lactation suite at the U.S. House of Representatives. Saint Lucy Books approached me about turning the project into a book in 2024. Over the following two years, I made additional photographs and recorded pumping oral histories.
Can you talk more about the necessity of making hidden or “invisible” care more visible in your series?
I want to give visibility to this hidden labor that is so important and life giving. Breastfeeding labor makes a significant contribution to the American economy, but it isn’t properly valued or supported in terms of policy or culture. My images reflect women being doubly productive by both pumping and working. This invisible care labor can be fraught and isolating in the workplace.
When I began the project, I didn’t realize the extent to which pumping is a cultural blind spot. I came to appreciate the educational dimension of these images. There’s a gap between cultural expectations in the U.S. that a mom should feed their child breastmilk and the reality of expressing milk, with all the logistics involved. I wanted to honor this unrecognized labor through photography.
Why is it important today in the United States to expose and dissect the architecture of care, in your personal opinion?
I believe Milk Factory speaks to urgent, broader questions surrounding the need to reimagine care in public life. The care workers who uphold capitalism are not adequately compensated or protected. Childcare costs are staggering, and parents are being crushed by a lack of structural support, particularly mothers, who continue to lose ground in the workforce.
At the same time, protections for maternal health are being dismantled, there have been cuts to programs and research that support women’s health, and women in the U.S. are not guaranteed the right to bodily autonomy. The book feels especially urgent in this political climate. Most parents want the best for their children. It’s a near-universal desire that has the potential to transcend political affiliations.
How have your own experiences shaped and influenced your message in ‘Milk Factory’?
Becoming a mother made me more political and community oriented. Neither my husband nor I qualified for parental leave at our jobs, and at the time I considered taking care of my daughter our personal responsibility. As time went on, I became aware that parenting has so much to do with access to resources and social structures. Lactation rooms are a band-aid solution for the lack of mandated paid leave in the United States.
I find it astonishing that we don’t have paid leave! The benefits—for families, for workplaces, for society—are well documented. Part of this work is envisioning a more just way of living and working. My hope is that by the time my daughter becomes a parent, paid leave will be a given, and the workplace will be more flexible and value caregiving.
What kinds of narratives or ways of thinking are you hoping to shift through your powerful images?
The photographs invite viewers into these life worlds, allowing them to see from the subject’s point of view. I want to draw attention to the mothers’ experiences, needs and desires, a vital perspective often missing from prescriptive norms and expectations around parenting. We have this ideal image of Madonna and Child in our cultural imagination, but it’s just not the reality in terms of modern parenting in the U.S. Many women are pumping in closets, bathrooms, or borrowed rooms, while looking at photos of their newborns during stolen minutes at work.
If the images inspire deeper awareness, empathy, or structural/policy change around care work that’s great. But I’m not interested in making prescriptive work; I’m drawn to work that leaves space for the viewer to find their own meaning. A few women have told me that the photographs reminded them how difficult breastfeeding was, while also making them miss it or wish to return with more awareness. I found that really interesting.
What are some of the most unusual spaces you photographed, and how did you gain access to them?
I photographed a solitary confinement cell converted into a serene prison pumping area in a woman’s prison; a dairy farmer’s pumped milk in her tractor; a congressional lactation room; and a lactation tent used by berry pickers in California. In many cases, my first point of contact was with the mother, and they secured me access to their workplace. In other instances, I approached the workplace directly. I’ve learned that as a photographer, being able to write a persuasive letter is almost just as important as taking a strong photograph.
When we think about modern parenthood in America, and especially motherhood, we are so backward in our policies, cultural attitudes and the way our infrastructure is set up. What kind of weight or value do you hope visual representations like your book will add to the ongoing discourse?
There are a lot of important statistics and data. I’m interested in how these truths can be seen and felt through representation. The book includes both photography and pumping testimonies from women across the socioeconomic spectrum.
These accounts are deeply moving—a police officer pushed to exhaustion in a hostile workplace, a bereaved mother who donated milk after loss, a prison lactation room that has the potential for intergenerational impact. Lived experience is a powerful form of knowledge. I’m interested in making a space for these marginalized experiences to be shared.
For those who are currently breastfeeding and pumping, what kind of comfort or support do you hope ‘Milk Factory’ will bring to them?
I hope the book makes them feel seen. When people open the book, they are invited to become part of a community. The solitary pumping experiences take on a collective power. Milk Factory reframes private struggles as shared realities. A mom recently wrote to me about the book, “I felt powerful surrounded by all these women.” I think that just about says it all.
You can order a copy of ‘Milk Factory’ out now, see more of Corinne’s work on her website, and follow her on Instagram.
