Whatever your art desires

Fiona Sturges on buying contemporary art in the comfort of your own home

"Art is the last branch of British retailing that treats its audience with complete disdain," says Johnny Gorman, chairman of Quantum Contemporary Art. "Can you imagine Marks and Spencer treating their customers like that?"

Despite valiant attempts by the likes of Habitat and Harvey Nicks to make the buying and selling of art a less formal affair, the customary setting is still formidably centred around hushed galleries with lofty attendants and even loftier prices. But why be patronised by over-fed art dealers when you can view the work of 100 artists in the comfort of your own home?

Quantum's collection of contemporary art (including Luke Elwes's Homeland, below) ranges in price from pounds 100 to pounds 4,000 and is available on slides, which they will bring to your house. Buyers may take their pick and have the chosen paintings brought for a "fitting" - a procedure that allows the client to view the art in the space for which it is intended and have their dignity left completely intact.

Making art-buying as easy as ordering a pizza may appal purists, but it's Gorman's intention to "demystify modern art and bring the best of it to our clients". With this end in view, six months ago Gorman got together with Camberwell College of Art to select artists from the 1,000 slides submitted by hopeful students and graduates.

Though Gorman has become the patron of young, up-and-coming artists, he says he will not be commissioning any likely Hirsts or Emins. He says, "For every person who wants a dead sheep in their living room, there are 100 or more who want something a little more representational, and that is what we can provide."

Call Quantum on 0171 498 6868. For tips on hanging art, see 'She's So Twentieth Century', page 10.