--Massachusetts earned a C in state government from the Pew Center. Given the state of the Big Dig, is it any wonder? [Boston Herald] --The Boston Center for the Arts (BCA, which includes Calderwood Pavilion and the Cyclorama) is undergoing a sudden change in leadership. [Boston Globe] --Glenn Ordway, local sports radio host on WEEI, is taking some time off the air because his wife and daughter sustained injuries during childbirth. [Boston Herald] --In related......

Daft Punk's Electroma Gus Van Sant, Isaac Asimov, and a French-loving raver walk into the desert... Not a joke, but the vibe of Daft Punk's art-house film debut that debuted at Cannes in '06. In what could either be called a long-form music video or a 74-minute silent movie, it's a beautifully-filmed story that touches on some classic human themes, but in a really twisted way starring robots. (It better have been filmed beautifully......

Dancing Hipsters Probably most famous for dating producing transatlantic hipster heartthrob MIA, Diplo made his name DJing. He's a dance music polymath who introduced the world to Brazilian Funk Carioca and Baltimore Club while inspiring a legion of white guys in skinny jeans to invest in Serato Scratch Live. He spins in Allston tonight. Great Scott, 1222 Comm. Ave, Allston. 9:00 pm. $15. Music --Darkbuster's Hometown Throwup continues with Hub City Stompers, The Allstonians,......

Art Somerville's Nave Gallery has brought us thoughtful installations before, but their new "Ghost Town" sounds positively compelling. Artists imagine our earth in a process of transformation, with cities growing and shrinking, populations moving, people interacting with nature, and everything cycling both naturally and unnaturally toward growth, decay, and chaos. Might sound like a bunch of hippie nonsense, but we think it makes for some appealing art. "Ghost Town" runs through March 21 at......

Movies The MFA calls Les Saignantes "the first science fiction film to come out of Africa," which should be reason enough to see it. But did we mention that it has won comparisons to Russ Meyer? And that it's about a group of women determined to rid their distopian future world of all men? Cameroon director Jean-Pierre Bekolo wins Bostonist's seal of approval. Remis Auditorium, Museum of Fine Arts, 6:00pm (also screening Sunday). $8/$9......

--Hendry Street isn't the only place suffering from the home-foreclosure crisis. In fact, so many areas are suffering that real estate agents are taking possible buyers on bus tours of other people's property. As if someone losing a home doesn't have enough misery, now they have to have complete strangers tramping about on the front yard. [Boston Globe] --A group of mayors, including Mayor Menino, are banding together with labor union reps in support of......

--MBTA General Manager Dan Grabauskas has received plenty of angry e-mails in his time, and should be able to take some serious heat. But he is furious about an e-mail from a Department of Corrections employee that got way too personal. Grabauskas is gay, and the e-mailer used anti-gay slurs about Grabauskas when describing MBTA service. Now Grabauskas is upset with Deval Patrick and his administration for not doing something about it sooner. The......

Awkward Lectures Cory Arcangel's best known artwork Super Mario Clouds turns the world's first scrolling video game into a digital environment of placid repetition. It percolated on the internet and spilled into the Whitney's Biennial, making Arcangel a digital art superstar. But his true calling may have been as a lecturer. Whether the topic is hacking old electronics or copyright; his willful ignorance of art history or his place in it, Arcangel always entertains.......

With over 20 million accounts, Second Life has become a pop culture phenomenon. An Internet-based virtual world, the metaverse in which we can be the person we've always wanted to be (without putting in the hard-work of exercise or educational training) have very few competitors. Currently, there is an exhibition going on in Boston called Mixed Realities - an exploration of real and synthetic places made possible by computers and networks. There's an exhibition......

Thanks to the Museum of Fine Arts’s ongoing exhibit Walk This Way, shoe-loving Bostonians have found a new excuse for their obsession: They’re not just conspicuous consumers, they’re art collectors. The exhibit—which shows shoes as pieces of art as well as symbols of wealth and power throughout the ages—is cleverly spread throughout the MFA’s galleries, organized, according to the program, as a “treasure hunt” for visitors. (Bostonist’s companion had more fun reading the map than......

The cold weather is no excuse for you not to get out! Human Dogsledding No kidding. The 8th annual National Human Dog Sled Competition will start today in Lowell. You can learn more about other Lowell Winterfest events, which sound like fun. However, for Bostonist, it is all about the human dogsledding--and teams usually wear costumes. Challenger rounds will be tonight at 6:45 and 10:00 pm, and championship rounds will be tomorrow at 3:30 and......

Console yourselves, people. Go out tonight. Puppetry! The Bread and Puppet Theater launches a run of several projects at the Cyclorama, including The Divine Reality Comedy, the "family-friendly" The Divine Reality Comedy Circus, and a "cheap art" show. And, yes, there will be bread--rye brad with garlic aioli, to be precise. Boston Center for the Arts Cyclorama, 539 Tremont St., South End. Runs through February 10. Movies The Coolidge Corner Theater is celebrating the......

Art The exhibit Rhythms of Modern Life: British Prints 1914–1939 shows the sharp, mechanical-feeling prints that set the artistic tone for the future. Museum of Fine Arts. Read Bostonist's preview of the show. Runs through June 1. Fashion Put away your spindles. Fashionistas can flash forward to the 21st century at Seamless, which showcases "experimental works in computational apparel design." The dry-witted Steven Rosengard of Project Runway 4 will be hosting, and Red Sox......

Rhythms of Modern Life: British Prints 1914-1939 Torf Gallery, Museum of Fine Arts January 30—June 1, 2008 In the collection of prints going on display tomorrow at the Museum of Fine Arts, humans are chiefly represented in clumps: anonymous crowds, armies, bocce players, orchestras, audiences, stick-figure Ballets Russes, eight men with oars forming a human motor, blurred passengers whirling around an ominous proto-Seussian merry-go-round—Oh, the places you (plural) will go. The exhibit highlights artists......

Human Rights Watch International Film Festival Various Showings, January 16-20 Museum of Fine Arts Boston and Peabody Essex Museum It can be easy to get caught up in local and national news, especially when election coverage is hot and murderous Marines are being sought. But even in the face of exciting events, we shouldn't lose sight of larger, less glamorous issues like human rights. Human Rights Watch has been keeping an eye on international abuses......

New Art 2008 MPG Gallery 450 Harrison Avenue, Suite 55 Friday, January 11, 5:30-8:00 pm If you're into art, tomorrow's your night! MPG Contemporary Gallery is hosting the opening reception for the 10th annual New Art 2008 contest, featuring emerging U.S. artists within 10 years of graduation and with no gallery representation. Contest entries were due last November, and Rachel Rosenfeld Lafo has put together a strong, diverse collection of art from the submissions. Contest......

Movies The rule is unspoken, but obvious. No T-shirts or sweats when you watch Lagerfeld Confidential, a documentary on the life of the legendary glamourpuss. Museum of Fine Arts, from today until January 17, $9. All showtimes from the MFA. Music Reconsider the ukulele with "Viva La Revel-UKE-tion!," in which the East Boston Make-Out Club Band and others pay musical tribute to the laid-back instrument. Club Passim, 26 Church Street, Cambridge, 8:00 pm, $10.......

Everybody's making "best of" lists at this time of year, but who's in charge of making a list of these best of lists? Well, nobody really, so we've put ourselves in charge and assembled a list of the "best books" lists of 2007. Nobody really needs another list, but a compilation of lists--and determining what's best according to all lists--is something helpful that nobody else really does. Bostonist has checked out several "best of" book......

--After the panic, let's think about the fun aspects of winter--sleighs, end-of-year parties, presents, twinkling lights, and the general atmosphere of coziness. --This just in: The Patriots win, and the world learns that referees are sensitive about snowballs. More from the Redux tomorrow. --In Massachusetts' ongoing effort to get as far ahead of the political primary process as possible, the Globe has endorsed Barack Obama as the Democratic nominee and John McCain as the......

Ethan Gilsdorf and Ted Weesner, Jr. Friday, December 14, 7:00 pm Willoughby and Baltic Art Space 195 G Elm Street, Somerville (T: Davis Square) Free Ethan Gilsdorf's official site Listings for readings may be slim while everyone is busy for the holidays, but it's quality that matters. Two recipients of fellowships from the Somerville Arts Council will be sharing their latest projects for free tomorrow night. Journalist/poet Ethan Gilsdorf and novelist Ted Weesner, Jr., are......

Willy Wonka & The Chocolate Factory in Smell-O-Vision Brattle Theatre, 40 Brattle Street, Cambridge Thursday, December 13, 7:30 More information If you missed the outdoor screening of Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory in Smell-O-Vision at Union Square this summer, you have the opportunity to miss it again. The indoor debut of the event is sold out. Last July, a group of artists led by Megan Dickerson and funded by the Somerville Arts Council, presented......

How did The Golden Compass, Juno, and Atonement do critically and commercially? Of Compass and its controversy, the Dig's David Wildman said, "So screw the religious nuts, there's no reason not to see this fun little flick." James Verniere at the Herald disagreed, finding it a "long and often tedious slog." Unless you're a sci-fi fan or want to stick it to The Man, you might want to stay away. The movie opened at Number......

Now that David, the Somerville LARPer, took the grand prize in Beauty and the Geek, we are focusing our attentions on Denise, the martial-arts aficionado with the heroic hair. Denise has hung on throughout several rough rounds of Survivor:China. This week, Denise caught a break since the reward challenge involved the presence of family members. The producers saved Denise's husband for last--for good reason. He is a big, burly dude who looks like he would......

School of the Museum of Fine Arts Sale Through Sunday, December 9 12:00 pm-6:00 pm 230 The Fenway, Boston (T: Museum of Fine Arts or Ruggles) Surprise your friends and family with original art instead of the standard old holiday presents like gadgets, bath soap, and socks. Five thousand pieces of art will be on sale at the School of Museum of Fine Arts this weekend, including original art by Ellsworth Kelly, which you......

Illuminations Holiday Tour Saturday, December 15 Tour times: 4:30, 5:00, 5:45, 6:15, 7:00, 7:30, 8:15, 8:45, 9:15 Tickets on sale at McIntyre and Moore Booksellers, 255 Elm Street, Davis Square More info Fighting off a raging case of Seasonal Affective Disorder? Somerville has a cure. The city's residents know how to decorate, and when it's the holidays they want to share their spirit with everyone. The Somerville Arts Council will be offering 45-minute-long trolley tours......

In October, Boston University threw down the gauntlet and declared plans to expand. Now, Boston College is one-upping BU with expansion plans of its own. BC's expansion plan rivals that of BU. BU said it would put in $1.8 billion, and BC has announced that it will spend $1.6 billion. The BC Heights reports that the money will go to construction and renovation, and 100 new faculty members will be hired. The rest will go......

The cold weather - and holiday festivities - descended upon Gothamist. The Rockefeller Christmas tree was lit, Broadway stagehand finally ended their strike, and NASCAR decided to run their victory lap through Times Square. There were disturbing photographs revealing the working conditions in which many city manholes are produced and ninjas were also a hot topic, either robbing homes or entering into alibis. But the city was really rocked by how Rudy Giuliani's visits......

Christopher Guest - actor, director, writer, musician, and Grammy-winning composer - stood solemn in his academic regalia on Friday night as a packed Berklee Performance Center crowd gave him a standing ovation. Looking every part the dignified scholar, Berklee's newest Honorary Doctorate of Music recipient nodded to the crowd. Then he raised his hand, made devil's horns, and got down to business. Guest told a story of a young boy, one who grew up in......

Multiple Singular Nave Gallery (155 Powderhouse Blvd., Somerville) Saturday, December 1, 1 - 5 p.m. Today is your last chance to check out Multiple Singular, the latest exhibition at the Nave Gallery in Somerville. Displaying works by Chris Nau and Kevin Dacey, Multiple Singular "brings together two artists whose work describes how multiple signifiers may illuminate an unknown by pointing to one singular reality/truth/identity/definition, but one that shifts according to the movement of its known......

Pollock Matters Through December 9 McMullen Museum of Art Boston College 140 Commonwealth, Devlin Hall 108, Chestnut Hill (T: Boston College. Directions by car.) Boston College is running an art exhibit addressing the relationship between painter Jackson Pollock and his friend Herbert Matter. The exhibit is national news because the paintings, which were discovered by Matter's son Alex, may or may not be original Pollocks. Numerous experts have evaluated these paintings to discover the truth,......