North EastArt Collective

North East Art Collective is a selling gallery inside the Eldon Garden shopping centre in Newcastle city centre, opened in 2010 with around 40 regional artists and now representing more than 150. Eleven small display rooms hold original paintings, prints, ceramics, textiles, photography, jewellery and glass, all made by artists from the North East rather than sourced nationally. The gallery selects work on artistic merit rather than commercial appeal, and offers the Own Art interest-free loan scheme to spread the cost of purchases over ten months. It runs as a single independent gallery rather than a franchise, and was included among the UK's Top 100 Small Businesses in 2014, with a showcase at Downing Street that followed.