Similarly, New York dealer Phyllis Kind, a pioneer in the outsider field who also represents contemporary mixed-media artists like Gillian Jagger and Alison Saar, recognizes that the best art transcends labels. She points out, however, referring to self-taught work, that "some examples of this art are really magnificent and much more coveted than others, and therein lies a phenomenon." What Kind is highlighting is a sense that the best of this work is so unusual that it cannot be categorized—and that its uniqueness must not be overlooked. Often it is deeply personal (the imaginary-world collage-drawings of the Chicago recluse Henry Darger, for example) or technically innovative (Mexican-born Martín Ramírez’s folk-futuristic pencil drawings) or inescapably spiritual (William Edmondson’s simple, gracious stone carvings). The most "outstanding" works by outsider/self-taught artists, Kind emphasizes, "must have been created by very special people—people for whom the artistic process itself becomes their entire concentration, their entire life, not infrequently identified as obsession."

Roger Ricco and Frank Maresca founded Ricco/Maresca Gallery in New York in 1979 and have coauthored numerous books about folk art and self-taught artists’ works. Ricco, an accomplished painter and fine-art photographer, echoes Kind’s remarks by noting that lately, as some contemporary art galleries have admitted "our artists" into their stables—a sign of category-dividing borders dissolving—"they simply have not worried about repositioning them." He adds: "Astute contemporary dealers see talent, opportunity and product. They find artists and show art and promote it." If some champions of self-taught art had long sought the validation of their field from the broader art establishment, now they have it—but could that recognition eclipse their field’s special status?

The academy has been moving in on outsider/self-taught territory, too, which is not necessarily a negative development, not when it results in such illuminating research projects as Sacred and Profane: Voice and Vision in Southern Self-taught Art. Co-edited by art historian Carol Crown of the University of Memphis and American studies professor Charles Russell of Rutgers University, this collection of essays published by the University Press of Mississippi examines the social, cultural and religious roots of self-taught works from one of the most fertile regions in the United States for this kind of art-making.

Jane Kallir, a co-director of Galerie St. Etienne in New York, which specializes in Austrian and German expressionism as well as in outsider/self-taught art, wrote a commentary in the Art Newspaper last summer in which she noted that, over time, value- and opinion-shaping influence in the art establishment appears to have passed from curators, critics and art historians to the marketplace. She notes, "It’s ironic, though, that in the outsider/self-taught field, the opposite seems to be happening: a field that was initiated by collectors and dealers is now finally starting to develop an art-historical infrastructure."

Looking ahead, Kallir says, "The big hurdle to jump will be the quality question. For the field to grow up, a lot of its inferior offerings will have to be jettisoned." But that, she observes, could spell the end of such specialized events as the Outsider Art Fair, which takes place each January in New York. At such fairs, leading galleries in the field may turn up alongside purveyors of merchandise that, as some collectors and exhibitors have noted, is of dubious value. The moral: Just because an unschooled person produced this found-object sculpture or that doodle does not mean that his or her creations are good art—or art at all.

"One reason we’re having so much trouble dealing with the question of quality—in our field and the larger art world—is that the critical establishment has become fearful of making aesthetic value judgments," Kallir says. "Qualitative judgments can too easily be construed as being racist, sexist, Eurocentric. So we exist in a critical vacuum—and the market rules."

Would Dubuffet, who died in 1985, be impressed to see how the field he helped create has developed? He predicted that the public would come to embrace outsiders’ works and show "ample disdain for the flashy, professional ‘artists,’ with their pseudo-‘art critics’ and dealers." "True art," he wrote, "lies elsewhere." That art has come into its own, as proved by its mature, international market and the intense debates surrounding it.

Correspondent Edward M. Gomez regularly writes about outsider art. His most recent publication is Hans Krüsi (Paris: Iconofolio/Outsiders, 2006).