It’s been said that prisons resemble factories, schools, barracks, hospitals — which all resemble prisons. In the history of Yarra Bend, this was more than a resemblance; they were the very same places. The land between Merri Creek and the Yarra River holds the story of an extraordinary number of institutions — schools, prisons, hospitals, barracks, and insane asylums — that sought to regulate the body and soul to create ideal workers, citizens, and subjects.  

Through multimedia storytelling, Underfoot: The Facility tells the story of carceral logics over the last 180 years and reveals whispers of resistance that still resonate today. A series of self-guided audio tours with accompanying maps, photos and annotated transcripts uncovers the unsettling stories of local institutions like the Yarra Bend Insane Asylum, and its use as a holding pen for immigrants who had outlived their years as productive workers; the Fairhaven Venereal Disease Clinic, a de facto prison for suspected sex workers; and the imprisonment of anti-Vietnam War protestors in Fairlea Women’s Prison.

What constitutes freedom, how has that changed, and who deserves it? Where does power come from? And how does power create resistance? The answers are right here, in our history, underfoot.

Map

About the creators

Underfoot is a multimedia storytelling project excavating the buried past created by Jinghua Qian and Liz Crash. The first season, Underfoot 3011, focused on the secret history of Footscray, while this second season moves to freshwater country on Wurundjeri land.

Liz Crash is a grasslands enthusiast and Melbourne local historian, focused on social history and the Western suburbs.
lizcrash.com | @asfarce

Jinghua Qian is a Shanghainese/Melburnian writer working across verse, prose, performance and broadcast. Eir work has appeared on ABC TV and in The Guardian, The Age, Overland, Peril, and 3CR Community Radio.
jinghuaqian.com | X: @qianjinghua | IG: @thejinghuaqian | FB: @thejinghuaqian

Acknowledgements

3CR gratefully acknowledges the support of the City of Yarra, Victorian Government and Public Record Office Victoria for making this project possible.