I caught Imagine on BBC 1 last night. Apart from just liking Alan Yentob, he’s the kind of favorite uncle you always wanted, the programme was about the Own Art scheme ran by the Arts Council. What Own Art Scheme? I’d never heard of it and apparently it’s one of the best kept secrets in the art buying world. Well it was until last night that is.

The schemes is designed to encourages us ordinary folk to buy original art which enables artists to take on commissions, sell work (A life saver to the cash strapped) and importantly to get art into people’s homes. And these were ordinary, small terraced homes in quiet suburban streets up and down the country, with a treasure trove of work.

“The Own Art scheme is designed to make it easy and affordable for everyone to buy contemporary works of art and craft including paintings, photography, sculpture, glassware and furniture.

You can borrow up to £2,000, or as little as £100, and pay back the loan in 10 monthly instalments – interest free. The scheme is available through a network of over 250 participating venues across the country.

Arts Council England aims to put the arts at the heart of national life. One of the ways they do this is to encourage people to live with art they love. They also want to help artists live by their creative output and support galleries who sell high quality contemporary art.”

The scheme also has a Facebook group though no they aren’t on Twitter or Flickr yet, which is a bit of a missed opportunity in my opinion. These channels could get us us closer to the working life of galleries and the art they sell which would be interesting and serve to life the vale of this previous private world. Flickr speaks for itself, it would help people brows art works in galleries and would join up the 250 galleries in the scheme.