When Michael Riley photographed Dolores Scott in the 1980s, she was a dancer with the National Aboriginal Islander Skills Development Association. She went on to work as a publicist for the Bangarra Dance Theatre and later became an educator. Her mother, Dr Evelyn Scott AO, was an Indigenous rights activist and social justice campaigner, one of the leading campaigners in the 1967 referendum, and chair of the Aboriginal Council for Reconciliation.