Urban Evening

Architect Bertrand Goldberg's answer to urban erosion was an ambitious nighttime playground for adults that aimed to please everybody all the time. The unrealized project would have included an array of theaters and multipurpose spaces for all manner of spectacle. His conceptual drawings, displayed in a rare exhibit tonight and tomorrow at Foundation (1221 Union, 816-283-8990), reveal him as a dreamy-eyed futurist adrift on a cloud of technological optimism. In Goldberg's sophisticated nocturnal circus, DeLorean and Porsche hybrid sports cars race through a big-top auto show with a spiraling ramp that spins around a minaret spearing the sky. The exhibit includes a music, dance and light performance by String Theory and fashion shows by Wearhaus. General admission costs $15; reserve a table for four for $100. It's a rare chance to see the work of an architect and urban planner who channeled a Jetsons kind of space-age idealism without seeming silly and who believed in the pull of the city core. And yet, in his Night World plans, Goldberg didn't seem to factor in a parking garage for all those SUVs that would flock from the 'burbs.
Fri., Nov. 9, 7 p.m.-1 a.m.; Sat., Nov. 10, 7 p.m.-1 a.m., 2007