First Artwalk of the Season Splatters into Spring

Spring has (sort-of) spritzed and the 2nd Friday of every month starting in April is always the super fab Coeur d'Alene Arts and Culture Alliance Art Walk. The first 2011 event will likely have all the local artsy-fartsy pretentious types (who I love, btw) cocked and ready to do the free wine shuffle up and down Sherman, after a long artsy-fartsy-free winter. It's a great chance to get a hint of what makes rich folks go downtown and whip out their American Express Platinum cards and it's also a chance  for us to break out some terms we rarely have the pleasure of dusting off, such as "ciaroscuro" and "repoussoire." And you'll be SO impressed when we use them, right?

If you've never experienced a downtown Cd'A Artwalk, what are you waiting for - Banksy to show up or something? Trust me, by the time you're through with the evening, you'll feel like there's more vim and vigor to Downtown Cd'A in the evenings than you possibly imagined, and the tourist annoyance quotient is mercifully low. If you're poor like me, you probably won't be able to afford any actually artwork, but it's good for the soul and the eyeballs to just stroll around Sherman Avenue, seeing friendly, familiar local faces and taking in the artwork, some of which can be quite remarkable (although there is still a fair amount of "looks good above the hotel couch" dreck). Not to mention, the ever-flowing plastic cups of boxed Livingston Red Rose.

Here is the full line-up for this Friday's Walk (above left - click to enlarge), along with a few samples of the work of some of the artists featured this time...

Art Spirit (415 E. Sherman Ave.) has "New Works by 13 Artists", including You Hold the Baby Helen So I Can Dance (enamel on Steel) by local art legend Harold Balazs (below)

Batiks by Toni Spencer at Gallery Northwest, 217 E, Sherman Ave.

Steven A. Scroggins' Floral Series at Steven A. Scroggins Gallery, 110 N. 4th St.

Printmaker Gordon Talley will be demonstrating his techniques at the Angel Gallery, 424 Sherman Ave. (below: Hiroshima Dawn)