Hein Koh is a 40-year-old artist living in Brooklyn, New York, and a mom to fraternal twin girls, Amelia and Oneida.
Last May, her husband, Jim Horowitz, took this photo of her working on her computer while breastfeeding Ami and Oni, who were 5 weeks old at the time.
Earlier this month, Koh posted a throwback to the photo on her Facebook page, which has been since been shared more than 2,000 times.
Koh told BuzzFeed News that the photo was "totally candid," adding that she pretty much always “tandem breastfed” her twins after she got the hang of it.
Koh said she shared the throwback because she was “sick of all the prejudice towards motherhood in the art world.”
“Men are allowed to have kids and still be taken seriously as artists, but when women have kids, people just assume their ambition and creativity will be compromised,” Koh said.
Koh said she did not expect her photo to go viral as she had only intended to target the art community with her post.
The responses have been overwhelmingly positive, Koh said.
“We live in a day and age when family models are changing,” Koh said. “Women aren't necessarily the primary caretakers anymore, so there's no reason women can't be as successful in their careers as men.”
Koh's full caption reads:
#tbt 5/19/15 when my #twins were 5 weeks old and despite the sleep deprivation and frequent (every 2-3 hours, 24-7, 45 min at a time) #breastfeeding, I was still getting shit done. #MarinaAbramovic thinks children hold women back in the art world, but as @dubz19 put so aptly, "FUKKK THAT". All Marina knows is her own experience, and it may be true for her, but that is not everyone's experience nor truth. Becoming a #mom (of twins no less) has personally helped me become a better #artist - I learned to be extremely efficient with my time, prioritize what's important and let go of the rest, and #multitask like a champ. I learned to function (even if barely) on very little sleep, and out of the chaos, insanity and even torture at times, a flood of new emotions entered into my work, becoming more interesting & layered as a result. I'm also not saying that artist parents are better artists than non-parent artists, or that choosing not to be a parent will deny you access to these learning experiences. What I am saying is that parenting is like any other challenge in life - the biggest fucking challenge in my own life thus far - and if you embrace it and figure out creative solutions, you can emerge a better person. It's important to think about the ways in which these challenges can help you move forward, rather than hold you back. Photo credit: Jim Horowitz. #artistmom #tandembreastfeeding #multitasking #heinkoh #greenpoint #brooklyn #nyc
