The Price of Milk

The Price of Milk is a sculptural exploration of the ways in which women’s bodies are measured, commodified, and subjected to value judgments, as well as the injustice and inequality they continue to face.

A brass scale—an instrument of supposed balance and fairness—holds a tit on each of its weighing pans, turning a symbol of nourishment into one of assessment.

The work critiques the historical and ongoing inequities imposed on women, who are too often valued for their physicality rather than their intellect, agency, or humanity.

By its very nature, the breast is a representation of femininity—fertility, nourishment, and the sustenance of life. Over time, however, it has also become a symbol of sexuality. Ancient figurines emphasize femininity through full-bodied forms and prominent breasts, while mythologies tell of women altering their bodies in response to societal roles—like Artemis, who cut off a breast to carry a quiver of arrows, rejecting femininity in favor of warrior-hood.

Today, society continues to struggle with maternal femininity, particularly as expressed through breastfeeding. Women experience complex emotions around it—some feel a sense of failure when unable to nurse, others fear it diminishes their sexuality, while some embrace it as an empowering act. At the same time, the Western world has hypersexualized the breast, surrounding it with excitement when exposed and obsession with its size. Some emphasize larger breasts through clothing or surgical enhancements, while others idolize smaller breasts, associating them with thinness and the suppression of overt femininity.

The Price of Milk exposes these contradictions, confronting the ways in which female bodies are both revered and regulated, nurturers yet objects of desire, weighed and judged rather than seen in their full complexity.