And the results of this latest arts experiment? Stunning, to say the least. One of the more recent artistic experiments happened in February, when Therrien featured a stunning exhibition of large-scale paintings by Yuko Yabuki, a bizarre butoh performance by CoCo Katsura, and noise art from Noncommunication. Initially dubbed ChemLab (and currently known as OP-Tic), it became legendary for hosting intimate photography shows and ginormous installation pieces, as well as sound-generating equipment and quirky technology-based events in which man battled machines.
It took me a few months to get things to where I wanted." Eventually, Therrien transformed his own personal laboratory, conducting all sorts of artistic experiments and helping incubate culture. "It wouldn't be fair to describe them as squatters, since squatters tend to fix up a place a little. Vincent DePaul was across the street, so when I got the building, there were people and their stuff everywhere," Therrien says. Formerly the home of Arizona Testing Labs - which examined and analyzed crime evidence for the Phoenix Police Department, as well as water and soil samples - the building contained broken equipment, trash, and a few homeless folks. When artist David Therrien first purchased this 9,000-square-foot warehouse south of downtown Phoenix in 1999, it was in disarray. Hey, it worked for that chick who wrote 50 Shades of Grey, which started out as a piece of Twilight fanfic. Meanwhile, hundreds of panels and events are held, featuring info on getting into the sci-fi book biz, discussions about the metaphors involved with aliens, public readings, and the possibilities of getting fan fiction published. As such, the lineup of special guests at LepreCon, which has been around since 1974, has included award-winners like Elizabeth Bear and Darrell K. While most of the geekazoid gatherings and conventions taking place around the Valley each year include science fiction and fantasy content, such topics take a larger focus at this event, particularly literary renditions of worlds that never were. Kennedy once famously waxed: "Some men see things as they are and say, 'Why?' I dream of things that never were and say, 'Why not?'" The optimistic sentiment, paraphrased from George Bernard Shaw, is something likely shared by the slew of speculative-fiction scribes who attend and appear at LepreCon each year. (A few of the locations are sadly no longer in existence, such as Metro's iconic basement ice-skating rink, below the food court.) We still get a chuckle whenever we drive past the Circle K at Hardy Drive and Southern Avenue in Tempe - the location where Bill and Ted meet their future selves - and invoke the memorable line from the same scene: "Strange things are afoot at the Circle K." Watching the film is a cinematic tour though such local landmarks as Golfland Sunsplash in Mesa, Metrocenter, and the Ralph Haver-designed Coronado High School in Scottsdale. The zany 1989 time-travel comedy was largely lensed in the Valley, which stood in for San Dimas, California. (That doesn't include Return of the Jedi, because it was shot just across the border from Yuma in California.) Other non-desert settings in Arizona have been seen in sci-fi films, including Starman, Star Trek: First Contact, and our personal favorite, Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure. Ditto for science fiction flicks, particularly post-apocalyptic yarns like Planet of the Apes - both the original and its execrable 2001 remake - or tales involving barren desert planets. It's due in part to our state's abundance of harsh desert terrain, which has proved an ideal setting for hundreds of Westerns. As any local cinema buff can tell you, Arizona has been a popular destination for film crews since the 1930s.