£10m in loans for new art buyers

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The Own Art programme offers interest-free loans of up to £2,000, repaid over 10 months, for people to buy artworks including paintings, photography, sculpture, glassware and furniture.

Since its launch five years ago, the scheme has generated £6.5 million in income for artists through more than 12,500 loans.

The Arts Council, which runs the scheme, said it had given a significant boost to galleries around the country, and had helped a lot of first-time buyers and people on lower incomes get into the art market.

Around 80% of the work bought under the scheme was fine art - paintings, sculpture and so on; around 15% was ceramics, jewellery and glassware and around 2% was photography.

Artists whose work has been sold under the scheme include Sarah Morris, renowned since the mid-90s for her complex abstract pieces. One of her prints was bought under the scheme for £395 from London's Whitechapel Gallery.

Iwona Blazwick, director of the Whitechapel Gallery said: "The Own Art initiative is a simple and effective way of enabling people to start their own contemporary art collection.

"The Whitechapel Gallery has always been about making great art accessible to everyone and Own Art helps make our beautiful artworks and editions by leading artists even more affordable, enabling everyone to invest in great art."