The Hyde Park Barracks is a confronting and emotional living record of early colonial Australia. As part of the Sydney Living Museums’ renewal of the site, three immersive film installations poetically tell human stories of the Barracks’ past and legacy.

Weaving together haunting photography and bureaucratic records, a 9-metre projection mural reveals the Barracks’ former use as a women’s asylum, and the documents that coldly record their existence.

In another room, intimate textures drift and flicker over the sculptural forms of dresses, accompanied by the spoken memories of their owners: young women journeying to the colony of NSW.

Life-size video portraits act as a coda to the experience, with descendants sharing the remarkable stories of their own connections to the Barracks, as well as thoughts on the Barracks’ history, and its impact on First Peoples’ communities.