“I’m the artist showing his work in this place — then the developers move in,” says Jay B. Kalagayan, referring to the eerie, semi-secret, gigantic subterranean chamber in the heart of Over-the-Rhine’s restaurant district where he’s hosting his current MeSseD Tunnel Tour.
He’s sort of joking about that — no one is yet thinking that the tour location, the sub-basement of 1311-15 Vine St., a 19th-century building known as Union Hall, is about to become an underground hotel.
The Cincinnati Center City Development Corporation’s website says it restored the above-ground Union Hall space in 2015 and owns the commercial portion of it; Cintrifuse owns the office portion. But in a neighborhood where seemingly every long-unused edifice appears to be getting renovated, who can tell? What’s below ground would seem to be next.
Meanwhile, Kalagayan certainly has found a historic locale, an old lager-beer cooling chamber designed to stay at 55 degrees. It dates to either the short-lived Cincinnati Brewery of 1849-50 or the Tivoli Beer Garden of 1878-1882, says Brewery District Community Urban Redevelopment Corp. Executive Director Steve Hampton, citing Robert J. Wimberg’s Cincinnati Breweries.
The MeSseD Tunnel Tour is an offshoot of the bizarre MeSseD comic book series, which writer Kalagayan and visual artist Dylan Speeg started in 2016; they now have 12 issues out with six more scripts prepared. The funny spelling highlights the fact it’s set in the tunnels of Cincinnati’s Metropolitan Sewer District (MSD). On the comic’s website, the creators describe it as a mixture of “sewer management and science fiction.”
When CityBeat’s Emily Begley wrote about the then-new MeSseD comic in 2016, she eloquently described its fantastical narrative this way: “Deep in the bowels of the Metropolitan Sewer District, a young woman in a baggy MSD uniform wades through knee-deep water, a small rat perched on her shoulder. A light on her hard hat illuminates a massive worm-like creature in front of her, fangs bared on each of its four otherwise featureless heads.”
Kalagayan, a founder of Know Theatre, received a People’s Liberty grant late last year to translate that comic book’s creepy ambiance into something more physically concrete. It would conjure the monsters, yes — as installed, it has soft-sculpture worms lurking in the darkness. But the project would also inform the public about the role of the sewer district. A higher-level, more finished basement serves as an information center about the MSD.
At last weekend’s opening, visitors assembled at the rear of the building, at 1314 Republic St. (the sub-basement’s actual address), and then signed waivers, donned protective helmets and safety vests, got small flashlights and tromped down several flights of stairs to parts unknown. (There is also an elevator.)
Arriving at the sub-basement, we were welcomed by a volunteer who warned us to step carefully onto the dirt floor. There, we could look around and see the raw, cavern-like space we had entered — with its old walls and arched ceiling, it is a trip back in time. It’s a full block long, with two separate but interconnected chambers.
We wound through enlarged comic-book panels on vinyl, watched a video-projected light show on the ceiling, and listened to the recorded sound of water.
Upstairs, I met education designer “Realsewer1.” He told some entertaining stories about what he has found as an employee of an unidentified local sewer-management utility. “The most unusual was a cotton-candy machine and a bowling ball,” he says. “I don’t know if they traveled together, or if they were mates.”
Kalayagan’s joke about “developers following in his footsteps” may yet turn out to be prophetic. “When 3CDC redeveloped Union Hall, the organization put the infrastructure in place to make the space an underground bar, restaurant and/or entertainment venue,” says Joe Rudemiller, 3CDC’s communications director, via email. “It’s a unique space that requires an imaginative tenant.”
MeSseD Tunnel Tours occur through June 16. Hours are 6-9 p.m. Thursdays and 11 a.m.-2 p.m. Saturdays (except May 26). Timed tickets recommended; there is a fee. More information: messedcomics.com
