Institute Of Contemporary Art

The Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA) is an art museum and exhibition space located in Boston, Massachusetts, United States of America. The museum was founded as the Boston Museum of Modern Art in 1936 with a mission to exhibit contemporary art. Since then it has gone through multiple name changes as well as moving its galleries and support spaces over 13 times. Its current home was built in 2006 in the South Boston Seaport District and designed by architects Diller Scofidio + Renfro.

The Institute of Contemporary Art was founded as the Boston Museum of Modern Art in 1936 with offices rented at 114 State Street with gallery space provided by the Fogg Museum and the Busch–Reisinger Museum at Harvard University. The Museum planned itself as "a renegade offspring of the Museum of Modern Art," and was led by its first president, a 26 year old architect named Nathaniel Saltonstall. The first exhibit curated by the new museum was "the first survey show of Paul Gauguin in the Boston Area." Also in this first year the institutions first fundraiser was held, the Modern Art Ball, to which many big names in the art World attended including Gala and Salvador Dalí who entered the ball dressed as sharks.