Artists invite you to drop in for a visit; Seventy North East artists are throwing open their studios during the Art Tour. David Whetstone introduces four of them.

One of the best legacies of the 1996 Year of the Visual Arts across the North East was the summer Art Tour, the 14th of which began last weekend.

For the aficionados it requires no introduction. They will know that visiting an artist's studio gives marvellous purpose to a trip into Northumberland.

They will also know that buying art direct from the artist can save you a sizeable sum. Nobody has been immune to the credit crunch, but the Art Tour could be a winner rather than a loser.

Run by Network, an independent association of professional artists, the Art Tour is a chance to see who's been doing what over the past 12 months.

This year's brochure divides the participating artists into geographical locations - South Tyne, East Tyne, North Tyne and North & Coast.

Art Tour participants can throw open their studios between 11am and 5pm each Sunday until July 19 (although Saturday, July 18 has also been designated an Art Tour day this year).

All the Art Tour studios are marked clearly from the nearest road by a black arrow on a yellow background.

On these pages you see just four of this year's 70 participants. All will be glad to welcome you to their studio tomorrow.

Carol Nunan and Rebecca Vincent are both based at Horsley Printmakers, The Hearth, Main Street, Horsley. They met 11 years ago when Carol's two children were young and she signed up for a print-making course at the Centre for Lifelong Learning at Newcastle University. It was run by Rebecca.

When a studio became available at The Hearth they decided to share it and Horsley Printmakers was born.

Both women are interested in landscapes, but take a different approach.

Carol says: "I grew up in Africa where the light is very different and the colours are brighter and more vivid. The colour is more subtle here and it's also very powerful." Because of the big open spaces and relatively small population, Northumberland reminds her of Africa in some ways.

Rebecca, originally from Lancashire, did an MA at Newcastle University and then ran the print-making classes.

"Carol came to everything I did and in the end she knew as much as I did," she recalls. "When I went on maternity leave I didn't want the class to be forgotten about so I asked her to run it and she seized the opportunity to be a tutor." The Pennine village of Garrigill, near Alston, is home to Lionel Playford who also did an MA in fine art at Newcastle University. A distinguishing factor of his work is that he uses natural pigments in his pictures, such as peat. There's "a child-like aspect to getting your hands dirty," he says with relish.

Lionel teaches fine art at Sunderland University and exhibits in a studio attached to his home.

Rena Holford, who lives and exhibits at Hagg Hill Farm, Winlaton Mill, combines a love of glasswork and horses in her eye-catching sculptural work.

The former fashion model embarked on a degree course in architectural glass and ceramics at Sunderland University in 2007.

The timing was unfortunate. She was living in a caravan with her husband and two teenage daughters while the farmhouse which they had just bought was renovated. She also had a kidney removed.

The family had just set up a livery yard for 16 horses as a business for the girls, now in their early twenties.

"Everything happened at once," Rena recalls.

But there was a happy ending. A life-sized glass sculpture of a horse attracted a lot of attention and Rena is now turning her attention to the red kites that are breeding locally.

For details of all Art Tour artists visit www.networkartists.org.uk

CAPTION(S):

FIRM FRIENDS Carol Nunan, right and Rebecca Vincent in their Horsley Studio. LARGER THAN LIFE Glass Artist Rena Holford pictured at her Winlaton Mill studio. WELCOMING Lionel Playford in his Garrigill Studio.