Artist Harold Balazs talked about his upcoming show in his studio near his home in Mead, Wash.,on Tuesday. Balazs’ joint show with painter Mel McCuddin, opening Friday at The Art Spirit Gallery in Coeur d’Alene, will hint at this new direction. (SR photo: Kathy Plonka)

It’s far too late for Harold Balazs to be an outsider. As an artist, he knows what he’s doing. Other people – lots of them – know what he’s done. “Outsider artist” is a term applied, loosely, to those who don’t know what they’re doing, technically – those working well outside the mainstream of the art world. Outsider artists haven’t been to art school. They don’t know any art dealers. Balazs – whose public art dots Spokane and Coeur d’Alene and whose exhibitions have drawn crowds to museums and galleries – knows he’s not fooling anyone. But he’s fascinated by the artwork of “outsiders,” who might be children and might be mentally ill people living in institutions, and how their minds seem to run, and how their work sometimes is “just so magical”/Adrian Rogers, SR. More here.

Question: Are you a follower of the arts in the Coeur d'Alene area?