Cordelia Gibbs: Fit, Form and Function; [And long hot days...]

[And long, hot days recurrent]

“And long, hot days recurrent”; bringing the importance of the Australian wool industry back to the masses….

“And long, hot days recurrent” is the 6^th line of the 4^th stanza of the poem Shearers by Australian poet Henry Lawson. It talks about the journey of shears as a person themselves; but also shows the essence of the shed in which they spend their lives. “and long, hot days…” relates to the lifestyle of anyone who works with sheep while the word “…recurrent” links back to a simple time when the Australian Wool industry was the most important sector of the country.

In a nation that ‘rides on the sheep’s back’, the shearing shed is an iconic representation of Australia’s journey ‘from the humbleness of the pioneer to the grandeur of the wealthy grazier’ (Sowden, 7). It represents the ideologies, the workmanship and the vigour that is the Australian sheep man. The sheep shed is a place for tending to sheep but also a place for people. It is from this one building where poems have been inspired, stories shared and a lifestyle shown at its most raw; where stress is high, work is hard and anything can happen. For me it is the heart of the farm- whatever that heart may be enduring.

What is fantastic about the shearing shed is that while the processes and architecture may have changed, the basic characteristics have not. I am inspired by the stories, poems, memories and legends of the wool shed from its humble beginnings to the present day, as a true representation of Australia.

I have chosen to look at the sheep shed from an overall perspective, although researching each area specifically in the progression. This is so I would be able to represent what the shed means to the individual workers, as well as what it means, or should mean, to the nation.