[2] The 28.3 by 21.8 cm (11 1/8 by 8 9/16 in) gelatin silver print depicts a mother anxiously gazing into the distance, with an infant in her lap and two older children huddling close by.

The photo captures the plight of migrant farm workers who arrived in California en masse looking for employment during the Great Depression.

Initially anonymous, the woman in the photo was identified as Florence Owens Thompson in 1978, following the work of a journalist for the California-based newspaper The Modesto Bee.

Today, Migrant Mother is considered to be a part of the classic canon of American art and international photography.

[5] The black and white photograph print held in the Museum of Modern Art is approximately the same size as a sheet of North American printer paper (11 1/8 by 8 9/16 in) so the woman and her children are smaller than life-sized figures.

She was driving home in March 1936 on a cold, rainy afternoon in Nipomo, California, when she passed a sign that said "Pea-Pickers Camp".

In a memoir written by Lange about the photoshoot, she writes, "I was on my way and barely saw a crude sign with pointing arrow which flashed by me at the side of the road saying Pea-Pickers Camp.

Lange sensed that she was invading her subject's privacy and was causing discomfort so she moved on to her fourth shot to regain composure.

[7] In Lange's fourth photograph, she asks one of the children to enter the frame and to stand with her chin resting on her mother's shoulder.

Additionally, moving left cut out the details in the background which she preferred not to show because of the possible implications that might sour viewers' image of her subjects.

In order to remove any possibility of competing gazes and any exchanges that might create unwanted effects, Lange asked both children to turn their backs towards the camera and place their hands on their mother's shoulders.

This allowed the subjects to be viewed as common men and women under unfortunate circumstances that the Roosevelt administration was trying to improve.

Her expression and juxtaposition with her children and clothing indicates that the family is overcome by circumstances they cannot control, thus removing any blame from the mother.

In addition to the presence of children, Stein argued that due to these implications and lack of resolution, Migrant Mother held a sort of inner tension that added to its power.

Lange and her colleagues worked very hard to convey their subjects with dignity such that their plight would receive sympathy rather than ridicule.

Curtis writes, "While middle-class viewers were sympathetically disposed to the needs of impoverished children, teenagers posed thorny questions of personal responsibility".

[5] The photograph has always been in the public domain and since its creation it has been reproduced many times including as postage stamps, as advertisements, for charity fundraising, and as magazine covers.

[10] According to Paul Martin Lester, a professor at UT Dallas who led a campaign to fundraise for a commemorative historical marker, and author Doug Jenzen, the series of photos is believed to have taken place next to what is today known as North Oakglen Avenue in Nipomo.

[11][12][13] As of the mid-2020s, the site was still a crop field, bordered by the same eucalyptus trees, between the northbound side of U.S. Highway 101 to the south and the outskirts of Nipomo High's football stadium to the north.