Technically Brilliant is ‘Warrington’s version of the Royal Academy’

The comparison comes after Technically Brilliant’s open call for their latest exhibition ‘Horizons’ which continues until July 27 boasting work ranging from £30 to £4,000.

Jo Smith continues to run the gallery with Matt George and their selfless volunteers. She hopes that the latest exhibition will draw even more interest.

Jo, from Lymm, said: “We are trying to be Warrington’s version of the Royal Academy of Arts in London as they do an open call and have been doing for more than 250 years.

“We want anyone to submit. We judge it just on the art not on who they are.

“We have people from all over the area.

“The visitors really like the fact that it’s someone local and they can relate to that person.

“We also have a preview and introduce artists to the buyers to see their faces, their connection and that is really important.”

Some of the artwork for 'Horizons'

Gerry Halpin MBE with his work

Matt says the pair take joy from seeing the artists’ reactions to their work - which must be a one-off print – joining the wall.

“It makes us very proud,” continued Matt.

“Getting a piece of work accepted is a huge boost for them and then when they sell it, that’s next level.

“When someone who doesn’t know them has come along and given up their hard-earned pennies to buy their art, it’s great and quite often the people who buy it are thrilled with it.

“It doesn’t even need to be commercially viable. We have some interesting pieces of work.

“We’re not a franchise of galleries where we have pop stars doing scribbles, we have regular folks who have maybe worked their whole career as a GP and have since taken up portrait painting.

“Putting yourself out there is daunting until you have done it a few times and that then encourages people to continue and go further.”

Another look at the wall, which only accomodates one-off pieces of work