‘SETTING THE STAGE’ WITH FOUR ARTISTS

Installations by four contemporary artists who work in representational style have just opened at the County Museum of Art and will remain on view through Feb. 16.

The exhibition, organized by Howard N. Fox, the museum’s curator of contemporary art, is part of the “Gallery 6” program and is titled “Setting the Stage.”

The works by Randy Hayes of Seattle, Tom Leeson of Los Angeles, Edward Knippers of Arlington, Va., and Patricia Patterson of San Diego are theatrical presentations meant to engage the viewer’s imagination rather than groups of single objects. They utilize the gallery space as if it were a theater, often using dramatic lighting, two dimensional cut-outs, props and large or larger-than-life-size scale. A second exhibition, “Gallery 6: Jay Phillips,” organized by Stephanie Barron, curator of 20th Century art, opens onThursday and runs concurrently with the four installations.

It consists of 21 multicolored aluminum paintings and sculpture by Jay Phillips from 1979 to the present.

A recipient of LACMA’s 1981 Young Talent Award, Phillips (who studied and worked in Southern California and currently lives in New York) cuts and folds metal sheets into various shapes. Freestanding or wallbound, they are painted in bold patterns and colors.

Also on view at LACMA through May 18 is a selection of 65 works titled “Before Daumier: Lithographs by Charlet, Decamps and Raffet From the Armand Hammer Collection.”

The three artists were closely associated with such significant Romantic painters as Baron Gros, Theodore Gericault and Eugene Delacroix.

Charlet and his pupil Raffet celebrated the Napoleonic Era and glorified Bonaparte’s military exploits. Decamps drew inspiration from the romanticized aspects of an orientalized Near East: he depicted desert landscapes, exotic dress and customs; his images relate to those Delacroix drew and painted after visiting North Africa. In addition, Decamps attributed exotic overtones to the French countryside, which were later echoed in the paintings of Jean Francois Millet and Charles Jacque.

“American Masters: The Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection” makes its exclusive West Coast appearance at the San Diego Museum of Art, Saturday through Jan. 12.

The exhibition of 115 paintings, consists of examples from American art history’s major movements and made its debut at the Vatican Museum in Rome in 1983.

Among styles and periods represented are 18th-Century portraiture, the Hudson River School, Luminism, Impressionism, Social Realism, Abstract Expressionism, Pop Art and Photo-realism.

Works by John Singleton Copley, Thomas Cole, Frederick Remington, Winslow Homer, Max Weber, Georgia O’Keeffe, Maurice Prendergast, Edward Hopper, Andrew Wyeth and Jackson Pollock are included.

The late Baron Hans Heinrich Thyssen-Bornemisza (1875-1947) began collecting the work of Old Masters in the 1920s. The present Baron, carrying on his father’s tradition, began by collecting 20th-Century American art and gradually became interested in American artists of the 18th and 19th centuries. The exhibition, along with its accompanying 175-page catalogue, was organized and is circulated by the International Exhibitions Foundation in Washington.

A current series of workshops at UC Riverside’s California Museum of Photography is intended to foster a better understanding of the museum’s role in the community.

Funded by a “seed money” grant from the Riverside Arts Foundation, the workshops will focus on “priceless” family photographs. For example, during the “History in Your Attic” half-day workshop on Saturday, curatorial staff will help participants identify the photographic processes used in early photographs and advise on their proper care and storage. Information: (714) 787-4784.

52 photographs by Ansel Adams taken in 1943 at the Manzanar Relocation Center can be seen in the George Doizaki Gallery at the Japanese American Cultural and Community Center. The show, titled “Born Free and Equal,” continues through Dec. 1. Information: 628-2725.