ICA

Dave Combs says he was in the cab with Shepard Fairey when Fairey was arrested outside the ICA. And he says that but for a couple of wrong turns by their cab driver, Boston Police would have arrested Fairey right at the entrance to the ICA, instead of out in the parking lot, deliberately provoking a riot to embarrass Tom Menino over his wage-freeze proposal, like this:

... The unmarked SUV follows our cab and drives right up to the front entrance of the glass-facade ICA with 800 of Shepard's fans inside and outside hyped on adrenaline excitedly watching, waiting for him to arrive. The SUV swoops in and the undercover cops emerge to seize Shepard right in front of all those fans. Now, I was in that crowd later that night, and I can be sure that at least a handful of those guys I met inside wouldn't have just stood there without doing something. It might have been that they ran out and shouted obscenities at the cops who were arresting Shepard, or they might have simply lost their minds and just mobbed the cops depending on the number of people who ran out, all while the cameras were rolling. Either way, something ugly certainly would have jumped off, and whatever happened it would have played right into the hands of the Boston Police Department and helped them hand the Mayor his ass on a platter. Remember, Mayor Menino was photographed just two days earlier congratulating Shepard and welcoming him to Boston. ...

Hey, I don't write this stuff, I just link to it.

Brian Robert Birke found a good place to watch people at the ICA.

Geoff Edgers provides the photographic proof that the architect of the new ICA lost out on some award because the winner has a bigger cantilever.

Just doesn't measure up:

Mike Mennonno reviews the "Super Vision" exhibit at the new ICA:

... "Super Vision" is an excellent example of bad, bossy curating. ...

Dec. 10 for the new museum, Geoff Edgers reports.

OK, call us nuts, but we had dinner at Anthony's Pier 4 tonight. I know, I know, nobody eats there anymore, at least not anybody who lives inside 128 (and indeed, our waitress seemed a bit surprised when she asked us where we were from and we said "here!" and, yes, we were surrounded by parents bringing their kids to school and Japanese businessmen and, based on the White Sox cap one of them was wearing, people from the Midwest). But it was good - good food and good service (although we didn't order any wine; the people next to us ordered wine to go with their calamari, the wine didn't come, the waitress said she couldn't bring it and when they asked if she could send over the wine steward, the guy took his time and then slowly walked over and said "can I help you?" as if the people were disturbing him somehow and as if the restaurant weren't mostly empty).

In any case, there are some great views from the restaurant and its pier. The Deer Island sewage treatment plant (above), normally gray, gray and more gray, turned a nice orangish shade for a couple of minutes at sunset. And the new ICA is quite dramatic at night:

Big Red and Shiny raises the question in a survey of Boston-area art galleries: