Have an art (From The Northern Echo)

Have an art

11:56am Tuesday 1st December 2009

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Imagine: Own Art (10.35pm, BBC1); Storyville: Simon Mann’s African Coup – Black Beach (BBC4, 9pm); True Stories: 21 Below (More4, 10pm); Country House Rescue (C4, 8pm)

BUYING art isn’t something that only wealthy people can do. A new breed of art collector is revealed in tonight’s edition of Imagine. These are people who aren’t rich – none earn more than the national average – and many have never bought original art before.

Presenter Alan Yentob visits Gallerina, in Duke Street, Darlington, to uncover a variety of people who are part of a small revolution in the art world. A pig farmer, a factory worker and a policeman are just some of those who tell how they came to appreciate art, how they chose their pieces and what they mean to them.

They have all signed up to an Arts Council scheme called Own Art, created five years ago to encourage the public to enjoy greater access to and engagement with the arts.

The scheme enables people to borrow up to £2,000 interest free to buy original contemporary works.

Gallerina was chosen from all the UK art galleries that deal with the Arts Council Scheme to be featured in the programme.

The film-makers chatted to customers about their art collections and the help they have received through the Own Art scheme.

So far, 12,500 people have signed up, many of whom grew up with no art on the walls at all, yet some have developed a passion that borders on addiction.

The film introduces collectors, young and old, who speak from the heart about how art has affected their lives. It also follows two people as they set about commissioning their own paintings.

THE Storyville documentary Simon Mann’s African Coup – Black Beach begins in 2004 when news broke of a failed plot to overthrow the government of Equatorial Guinea that had involved several British businessmen.

Everyone took even more notice when it emerged that Margaret Thatcher’s son Mark was implicated in the unsuccessful coup.

Simon Mann was also among those arrested on suspicion of plotting a coup, an offence under British terror laws. He was released last month and flew back to Britain to meet his young son, who had not been born when he was locked up.

Filmed over the course of 18 months, this documentary sheds light on the circumstances that led Equatorial Guinea’s president Teodoro Obiang Ngeuma Mbasogo to imprison Mann, who claimed to be part of an organised Western plot to seize control of Obiang’s country.

THE True Stories strand, showcasing international documentaries, presents Samantha Buck’s intimate portrait of a very ordinary American family living in Buffalo, New York, who are undergoing the hardest of times.

The film sees family member Sharon, who is expecting her first child, arrive to act as a mediator between her parents and her younger sister, Karen, who is pregnant for the third time.

The unborn child’s father is a drug dealer and the sisters’ Jewish parents find it almost impossible to reconcile Karen’s lifestyle with their own.

But there is more than one crisis affecting the family. Karen’s second child is terminally ill with a rare genetic disease and has a life expectancy of three years.

IN Country House Rescue, design expert Ruth Watson gives advice to owners of stately homes on how they can transform their properties from a state of shocking disrepair to state-of-theart properties.

Earlier on in the series she visited Black Clauchrie in the wild and beautiful landscape of South Ayrshire, and bordering Galloway Hills and Forest Park.

Built in 1901 as a hunting lodge, the arts and crafts-style lodge was taken over four years ago by builder Adrian Goodall and his wife, Caroline, who intended to carry out extensive works on the mansion.

But they were struggling to raise the funds needed to keep the renovations upto- date. As a result, their own relationship was coming under increasing pressure.

In tonight’s update, the programme returns to the site to see if any progress has been made and, more importantly, whether Adrian and Caroline have got their marriage back on track.

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