BLUE FOUR IN LONG BEACH

An exhibition of works by painters Paul Klee, Wassily Kandinsky, Alexei Jawlensky and Lyonel Feininger, who were known as the Blue Four, opens today at the Long Beach Museum of Art and runs through May 19. The exhibition is dedicated to the memory of Galka Scheyer, who first brought the work of these artists to the West Coast, in 1924.

In 1933, when the Nazi regime designated the the Blue Four as “degenerate artists,” she returned to Germany and brought back more of their work. That same year, due to the unfavorable political climate, Kandinsky left for France, Jawlensky and Klee fled to Switzerland and Feininger, an American citizen, returned to New York. Scheyer continued to represent them in the United States until her death in 1945.

The exhibition is drawn from the museum’s Milton Wichner Collection, the collections of Carl Djerassi, Jane and Harold Ullman, Tobey and Allen Moss, the Santa Barbara Museum of Art holdings and some of anonymous lenders.

Running concurrently with the exhibition is a series of screenings of new videotapes of performances and installations by artists from Belgium, Germany and the Netherlands, titled “In View Of. . .”; information: (213) 439-2119.

“The Eighth Annual Downtown Artists Show” opens Friday at LACE, 240 S. Broadway, and continues through May 18. This year’s exhibition was selected by Bill Olander of the New Museum in New York. Olander reviewed more than 90 entries, visited 25 studios and selected 10 artists: Robert Aull, Monique Safford, Cheri Gaulke, Cam Slocum, Walter Lab, Sabina Ott, Alan Sonneman, Judy Simonian, Brad Read and Fran Siegal.

At the County Museum of Art, the newly opened, “Toulouse Lautrec and His Contemporaries: Posters of the Belle Epoque from the Wagner Collection,” runs through June 16.

The latter exhibition features 104 posters, of which 31 are by Lautrec and 73 by 23 of his contemporaries, among them Pierre Bonnard, Jules Cheret, Alphonse Mucha and Theophile-Alexandre Steinlen.

Also at LACMA, through June 15, are paintings by contemporary realist painter Sandra Mendelsohn Rubin. This is the latest in a series of Gallery 6 exhibitions.

Three sculptures by nationally recognized artists Loren Madsen, Peter Alexander and Joan Brown have been selected for Horton Plaza as part of the expansive scope and the innovative architectural concept of the Jerde Partnership, designed to make the plaza an entertainment and cultural oasis in downtown San Diego. Each work is is being formulated for a particular section of the project.

Two new exhibitions at UCLA’s Wight gallery: “The Artist and The Quilt,” and “May Stevens: Ordinary/Extraordinary, A Summation 1977 -1984.” The first show presents 20 quilts designed by prominent contemporary women artists such as Miram Shapiro and Betye Saar and executed by expert needleworkers. The second exhibition consists of words and images about the artist’s mother (who lives in a nursing home) and on Rosa Luxemburg, martyred Polish/German revolutionary leader and theoretician.

Although admission to the gallery is free, a $3 parking charge is required for all UCLA parking seven days a week.