Aboriginal icon and model Elaine George shares her touching history with Cairns
From social work to catwalk, Aboriginal icon Elaine George has been breaking down barriers for decades. Here she reveals her touching connection to Cairns.
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TRAILBLAZING Indigenous model Elaine George returned to Cairns Central for its spring-summer fashion campaign, revealing her touching connection to the shopping centre and the city.
When Ms George showed up to work earlier this month it set off 15 minutes of gentle ribbing from her team.
“My boss is laughing at me because I still have the fake eyelashes on,” she said.
“They’ve never seen me like that, because I work in child protection – it’s usually jeans and a shirt.”
Her colleagues at NGO Key Assets could be forgiven for forgetting the salt-of-the-earth 47-year-old graced the cover of Vogue Australia in 1993, making history as the first Indigenous person to do so.
From Vogue, Ms George was signed with Australia’s biggest agency and moved to the United States to pursue her modelling career.
It was from there she was asked to be the face of the new Cairns Central, flying back down under to launch the shopping centre when it opened a quarter century ago.
“Cairns Central took a risk 25 years ago to have an Aboriginal person come up to Cairns and open the centre,” the Arakwal woman said.
“Their whole project was to bring Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people into Cairns Central, and that was a big deal.”
It was not all smooth sailing, with some hiccups on the runway.
“The sort of screen for backstage doesn’t go quite high enough. I only realised that as I was running downstairs whipping off a top and someone wolf-whistled,” she said.
“I looked up and made direct eye contact – I realised they could all see me.”
It was in preparation for the centre’s opening catwalk that Ms George met her future husband, Damien Tanaka.
“We were doing rehearsals and Cairns Central hadn’t been properly done yet, so you still had the plasterers and electricians and stuff hanging around,” she said.
“They all stopped to watch – I think because I was the only black one they’d seen.”
After rehearsals, a group went across the road for some food and the pair started chatting.
“Instead of me going back to the US to get all my stuff, I decided to stay here with him … I just left all my stuff behind, never went back” Ms George said.
Mr Tanaka and Ms George had two children together and while they’ve since separated on good terms, Ms George maintains a lasting connection to Cairns with a large network of in-laws and friends.
It was why she jumped at the chance to return for Cairns Central’s current Spring Summer fashion campaign, ‘Spring in Bloom’, which kicked off Friday and runs for three weeks.
“It was exciting … but I was also like, do you know I’m not a size 8 and I’m not 19 anymore?”
Ms George said she was surprised how well Cairns Central handled the shoot, where she was joined by women of different ages and body-types to create style advice videos.
“When I got to the photo-shoot they actually had proper size 12 clothes. I didn’t have to bobby pin them every which-way to fit. And the make-up artist knew how to do make-up and hair for an Aboriginal person; they recognised we’re not just the same,” she said.
“And they (Cairns Central) don’t treat Aboriginal and Torres Strait as the same thing. They’ve really led the way in recognising they’re two different cultures.
“I was really impressed with it.”
Cairns Central Marketing Manager, Louise Struber, said they were “thrilled” to have Ms George on the campaign, as someone who “has paved the way for First Nations models”.
The fashion industry has not always been quick to embrace diversity – after Ms George’s cover it was 17 years before the next Indigenous model, Samantha Harris, would front Vogue.
But she said Cairns Central had been a leader in developing a reconciliation action plan, and changing their casting-call approach to find more Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander talent.
“You can’t do a typical casting, we’re not going to show up! That’s not what we do, we don’t want to big-note ourselves,” Ms George said.
Ms George’s break into modelling came at age 17.
After saving up to take her sister to Dreamworld on the Gold Coast she was spotted in line for a ride by a talent scout.
The cover of Vogue’s coveted September issue was her first modelling job – the significance of which did not register for the young girl who grew up in a Brisbane housing commission and had never heard of the magazine before.
Despite the glitz and glamour of high fashion, Ms George’s passion has always been helping Aboriginal children and preserving cultural connection – her own family being part of the Stolen Generations.
“I’ve been in child protection for 30 years … at the moment I support non-Aboriginal foster carers to understand our culture and how important it is to maintain that family connection.”
Whether social work or catwalks, Ms George’s impact in breaking down barriers is clear – jumping from her Cairns Central photo-shoot to call a judge advocating for foster children, before seamlessly slipping back in front of the camera.
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