Radio Chthulucene 87.9 FM

On our campus there are many spaces for which I have developed a personal affection, whether it be through patronage or residency, studying or socializing. After spending the day in a study room on the sixth floor I might have committed to memory that particular view; ten weeks of an especially influential course and the classroom might stick with me forever. My first year my friends and I would haul a wagon of battery-powered lights and vodka to a (somewhat) secret garden near Revelle to host parties, and that space will always occupy a part of my mind and heart.

The woods just north offer a quiet place to smoke. When you enter from the trailhead at Voigt and Hopkins, the right fork winds along the canyon’s perimeter toward a shoulder off the trail, a concealed path flanked by several enormous eucalyptus. Down by the edge of the grove lays a dingy plywood board, and a distant view of the cars crossing Genesee, the sagebrush of the lower ravine, a lecture hall I used to have a class in. We tied a fraying yellow rope to a branch to build a swing, dragged logs over to sit more comfortably. Now that I don’t frequent it as much, the space feels like an old bedroom. But it has one fault when it comes to radio transmission: no outlets.

I am thinking of an electrically-equipped location of personal significance, but I am not optimistic that it would be approved. For decades the McGill Hall east stairwell has been a hotspot for student art, expression, and counterculture. UCSD has repeatedly, and without fail, painted over this work. Last year a group of students attempted to revive this facet of campus culture, only for it to be removed again. I would love to install my project in this space as a means of protesting the silencing of student self-expression. Since they disliked the artwork that originally lived in the space, though, I’d be surprised if McGill allowed that. Thus I wonder if the graffiti park (i.e. the pathetic school-sanctioned consolation) near the Old Student Center might be an apt location, as well, and convey a similar message.

At its peak, this movement spanned many buildings; the image above is not of McGill Hall, but depicts something similar in a different UCSD building.

Early beginnings of the space’s revival in 2023