Asja was 37 years old when she had her second child, daughter Yuna Feline. After the birth, Asja and her partner realized that they needed more help, support from their grandparents. Berlin was too stressful for the young family, so she moved - back to Bremen.

Life with children is mostly exhausting, exhausting and annoying, says Asja. Nevertheless, they give you a special form of joy, meaningfulness and lightness. But this little part outweighs everything else.

From 2016 to 2018, photographer Aleksandra Weber portrayed women like Asja for her photo series "Madonna". Weber spoke to the mothers on the street, found them in her circle of acquaintances and in a mother-and-child center.

She photographed the mothers with their children in their arms, mostly near their homes. Weber has deliberately decided to show only women, men have no place on the recordings. She is interested in mothers' experiences and wants to document their independence, strength and self-determination.

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10 pictures

Mamma mia: between bliss and overreach

Each of them faces challenges and needs to deal with change - like Lotta, for example. A third child she had not planned, especially because the 36-year-old still has to nurse her grandmother. For the first two children, she had great problems finding a childcare place. But now everyone has come and the youngest, Titus, is cared for seven hours a day in a parents' initiative, so that Lotta can currently work 18 hours a week in retail.

Photographer Weber also knows what life is like when a child is changed. She is a mother herself and quickly realized that there was hardly any time for her own interests. That one is burdened physically and emotionally. That it can be difficult to reconcile family and work.

Weber wants to meet the women photographed again in a few years - and then capture in the picture what has changed since then.