Ashley Graham is a supermodel who has spent more than 2 thirds of her life in front of the camera and the media. I feel like she should have been a household name much sooner than she has, I didn’t know of her existence until a couple of years ago, and I believe the reason is she isn’t a standard waiflike body type as our well-known, household names that are supermodels. She was born October 30th 1988, and Graham’s big break came in the year 2000 when she was noticed in a local shopping centre in Nebraska, her hometown. This was the beginning of her media identity. Her relationship with the media is crucial to her cause and her message as a “body activist”. Without the media, she can’t get her message out, and certainly not with as far of a reach.
“I felt free once I realised I was never going to fit the narrow mold that society wanted me to fit in.”
This narrative begins and continues throughout her modelling career, E-News reposted the photo her husband, Justin Ervin, took of her while she was very pregnant with her first son. Stretch marks, rolls, and a continued public nudge and encouragement towards authenticity. One year ahead she is pregnant with her twin boys, posting another entirely naked image to her Instagram, the title simply reading “My husband says my stretch marks look like the tree of life”. She runs all of her social accounts because that’s the medium that works the best for her body activism. On an application that promotes unhealthy and unrealistic beauty standards, this unattainable idealization encourages Facetune and filters with no end in sight.
She told People in a video that was posted to YouTube in 2018, that nowadays you have to know how to take over your social media, one of the hosts asked if she has a specific technique to which she replied “No it’s based on an am I feeling this?” motivation, or something as simple as “is this an outfit I want to show everybody?”.
Ashley informs the hosts that she doesn’t get anxious before posting on social media because of her opinions on anxiety, nothing relating to “acceptance” because as long as she accepts herself that’s the utmost of all that matters. “Don’t fall into the trap of sacrificing your self-esteem for affection and acceptance. I am more than my measurements. The cycle of body-shaming needs to end. I’m over it… My body is MY body. I’ll call the shots.”
In 2021 she posted a TikTok captioned “Have you celebrated yourself today?” which strongly suggests that she wants the public to follow suit, following up with a “self-love challenge”. She encouraged herself and others to appreciate all of their bodies’ unique features. She displayed her legs, which she states were the strongest part of her body. What is the sexiest aspect of her body? Her eyes. She gently stroked her jawline, which she states is her favourite part of her body. Four days later and one million, five-hundred thousand views. Her relationship with the public holds the most weight regarding the media, it shows there are no limitations be it in race, age or sex.
The Academy Awards were held in Los Angeles in 2019 and Ashley Graham was the host, interviewing celebrities on the red carpet. One of her interviewees was Jason Momoa and his wife Lisa Bonet. She asks Momoa to perform the Haka, saying “Like one Haka move, come on!”. Graham was eventually able to get Momoa to perform one of the dancing moves. He put his tongue out at the camera, which Graham copied by sticking her tongue out as well. A cringe faux pas, that is for certain. Most of the research I performed holds Graham in a positive light, only mentioning her warm demeanour and being a much-needed activist for accepting people’s bodies irrelevant of the size tags. I thought her conversation with Momoa on the red carpet was the only time, in the media, that she wasn’t put in a contemporary, positive light. After this event some of the headlines read: “Fans Are Dragging Ashley Graham for Asking Jason Momoa to Perform The Haka”, “Ashley Graham Gets Slammed on Twitter, Accused Of Being ‘Racist’ After Asking Jason Momoa To Do The Haka On Oscars Red Carpet”, “Oscars 2019: Ashley Graham strikes foul note asking Jason Momoa to show her a ‘haka move’”. The consensus can be summed up in one quote by Bolu Babalola (@BeeBabs February 25 2019) “That is….horrible. Why do white people always want (people of colour) to *perform* their culture for them as entertainment? It’s gross.”
It even hit Australian shores, with the headline screaming “Cringe-worthy Oscars red carpet moment we all missed. Supermodel Ashley Graham’s request for a dance from Jason Momoa on the Oscars red carpet has been slammed as ‘ignorant and inappropriate.’” With that being said, this was all I could find on her that suggests something other, than the mass amount of positive media that surrounds her name. She does very well in keeping her narrative the same consistently over time, when you consider her twenty-plus years in the public’s eye, it’s quite impressive. I believe that’s partly due to her standing firm, and needing to be part of the message and a notable part at that. This is why we the public, agree that she’s consistent, reliable, and among all else she is real and her message is authentic. That’s what draws us in and keeps us around. Unfortunately, it isn’t something we’ve seen in the entertainment industry that holds the same amount of weight as her words do.
I’m not suggesting that Graham’s rise to fame was an easy one, we know based on headlines we the consumer read daily, how toxic, shallow and “image-based” the famous are judged by continually. She’s even spoken up about the challenges she’s had in the fashion world, claiming that because of her size, she’s had to “work harder” than other models. In 2016 Graham became the first size 16 American (which equals to a size 20 in Australia) model to be featured on the cover of Sports Illustrated, which was only 5 years ago. It shows how abnormal this would have been when the magazine was released, which is shocking. Bodies should be bodies and nothing more, something we are getting used to seeing, but it took a very long time. We were, and still are stuck in the ways of old, like in the 1990s when a tiny Kate Moss, became a household name almost immediately after gracing the pages of Vogue Magazine. Back in 2017, Graham spoke on the matter of her not having walked the catwalk for Victoria’s Secret and even to this day she still hasn’t. Her post on Instagram, which was shared the same day the VS annual show was to be released, captioned “Got my wings! … my #AdditionElle wings! #thickthighssavelives”, as there was wings photoshopped onto her, from the Elle Runway that showed in 2016, one year prior. Fans who commented on her post called for VS to make a change, saying: “PLEASE diversify the runway ASAP to include the spectrum of beauty across all shapes and sizes!!”. The 31-year-old stated that her road to fame, which has included appearances on the pages of Vogue, Elle, and Glamour, hasn’t always been easy. “I have had to work harder than everybody else because of my size,” she told Harper’s Bazaar UK. “I’ve always had to suck it up. If you’re the kind of person who’s never been glamourised in fashion then you have to justify why you’re meant to be there through your efforts.” Despite the obstacles she has come across, she doesn’t choose to use the word “hard”. “Has it been hard? I’d prefer to say that it’s been rewarding,” she stated. She warned that there’s “still so much retouching that’s happening, trying to change who we are”, adding that people have tried to “manipulate” her body for years.
I see Ashley Graham using all forms of media as a tool, whether it be in video, interviews, social media posts, clothing or makeup collaborations. Instead of being a product of the media, she chose to use the media to her advantage, only accepting partnerships that reflect who she is, not the other way around. That’s why when she voices her opinions we listen, on a mass scale. Her trustworthiness is delivered consistently, which is why her message is a success.
By Brenna Richter
