At around 14 years of age, I spent time during my school holidays in a town south of Perth called Kojonup, working as an offsider during shearing season. My father was wool pressing and had brought me down to help – perhaps so we could spend time together or perhaps so he could try to toughen up the soft, quiet boy I was at the time.

In the shed I found myself surrounded by this group of men, shearers whose masculinity I was unfamiliar with. They were boisterous, humorous and crude. I found them fascinating, intimidating and attractive. I was an observer to their homosocial bonding through their work and their stories.

Working with Polaroid film and drawing from Australia’s homoerotica archives allows me to subvert the spatial and temporal logic usually associated with the photographic medium. ‘Shearers’ smoko’ is an imagined view of the life of these men.