Sunday, March 15, 2026

FINAL Call for Entries: New England Art Club Annual Exhibition 2026

You have until 12 noon on Friday 20th March to submit your entries for the New England Art Club Annual Exhibition.

While the seriously committed will have submitted their entries already, there's still time to submit that work which you are pleased with.

Historically, the New English Art Club was founded by a group of artists dissatisfied with the entrenched attitudes of the Royal Academy

Today, its intent is spelt out by its President Patrick Cullen

At the heart of the NEAC is the search and propagation of meaningful, resonant art. It is committed to authenticity through the observation of life, as well as the task of articulating and communicating ideas with the beauty of skilful language.

FINAL Call for Entries: NEAC Annual Exhibition 2026


Entries from open artists are welcomed.
The NEAC Annual Exhibition is a showcase not only for its members but also for aspiring artists: with a history going back more than a hundred years, it is an opportunity for work to be seen alongside some of the best artists today.
I describe the process below. Here are the links to all relevant pages
NEAC is not an art society which is afraid of colour!
(NEAC Annual Exhibition 2025: End of West Gallery)

If you want to know what NEAC is about, take a look at my pics of the 2025 Annual Exhibition

Last year, the exhibition 389 artworks which included a lot which were big to very big - which made the hang look very crowded to me

Guidelines re Sales and Pricing

You can see the nature and price of the artworks which sold in 2025 by right clicking HERE and opening in a new tab

  • 60% were painted in oils
  • just over 20% were landscapes and cityscapes
  • just over 10% were portraits
  • just over 10% were still life
  • the remainder covered marine and coastal (4), other (1) and abstract (2)
In terms of sales, 17 of the 50 sales were by open artists - and the majority were by women. I think it not unlikely that most of the sales were heavily influenced by women too.

For the record, although I've not crunched the numbers for 2025, there are some guidelines for open artists if you want to achieve a sale
  • sales drop off once you breach £1,500 which I've identified for a long time as an important threshold for sales (i.e. not a lot above this, and these are mostly by members)
  • OPEN ARTISTS tend to do better in the £500-£1000 price range and pricing - and this is consistent across a number of the art societies exhibiting at the Mall Galleries
I noted in my Review: New English Art Club Annual Exhibition 2025 that the following seemed to be popular
  • paintings by artists like Melissa Scott Miller - of places people know and which are colourful and cheerful but much less “in your face” and a much more "hangable" size
  • rather a lot of paintings by women painters who are becoming very old - but are still painting. People like June Berry (now 100 years old) and Jacqueline Rizvi (now 80)
  • small paintings - by those with limited wall space left! (That's people like me!)

Important Dates


The Annual Exhibition will be held between 11th - 20th June

You have until Friday 20 March 2026, 12 noon to complete your online submission and application form - and pay the entry fees.

Notifications relating to selection and receiving day are
  • Notification of pre-selection: Friday 27 March, 12 noon
  • Receiving Day (if pre-selected only): Saturday 18 April, 10am to 5pm
  • Notification of final selection: Tuesday 21 April, 12 noon
Private View 2025

The Private View is invitation only 0n Wednesday 10 June. I tend to go early or late as the busy part has too many people to see the art and too few chairs for the likes of people like me who walk with a stick.

The exhibition then opens to the public on Thursday 11 June, 10am to 5pm daily and closes on Saturday 20 June, 5pm. 

Who may enter


Any artist over 18 may submit, in the UK, EU, and outside the EU.

It can be a waste of time entering if you are an international artist and don't know about shipping art to international exhibitions and VAT registration.

See my Art Business Info for Artists website and specifically
Plus note also that
  • all international submissions will be selected ONLINE ONLY,
  • ONLY selected international artists will need to ship their work to the gallery on a date to be announced

What can you enter


The main requirements are:
  • All works MUST be an original creation by the artist (i.e. original = you must be able to assert copyright)
  • Work must have been completed in the last two years
  • Work must NOT have been exhibited in London previously.
  • Works should not be larger than 2.4m along the longest dimension.
  • You can enter a maximum of six works each, from which up to three works per artist may be selected.
Acceptable media includes
  • paintings,
  • drawings, and
  • original framed prints (excluding photography).
  • sculpture is NOT admissible.
Last year Artworks included the following media:
  • paintings - in oils, acrylics, gouache, watercolour, and egg tempera (but most were in oil)
  • drawings - in charcoal, pastels, conte, colour pencils, graphite, pen and ink and mixed media
  • fine art prints (very few) - etching, aquatint, wood engraving,
You can see photographs of the artwork selected for last year's exhibition on my Making A Mark Facebook Page in the following albums
You can also see it online as a "past exhibition" on the Mall Galleries website

How to Submit


The exhibition's entry process is
  • online only
  • organised by the Mall Galleries on behalf of NEAC.
  • managed on a third party basis by OESS who process digital submissions and notify artists of the results of selection.
The process is TWO stage for UK artists
  • FIRST: digital submission - which leads to pre-selection after which you send artwork for review
  • ONLY IF PRE-SELECTED: physical submission - delivered to Mall Galleries, London ON Saturday 18 April (NOTE This is NOT "by", this is "ON")
  • Works should be delivered unwrapped with the relevant form and labels, which are downloadable upon notification of selection.
The process is ONE stage only for all international artists i.e. artworks are selected for hanging from the digital submission only. 
  • international artists will need to ship their work to the gallery if selected only, on a date to be announced

Pre-Selected & Framing

If pre-selected you have three weeks to get your artwork framed and delivered to London.

I recommend you 
  • either have your frame worked out in advance - just in case you are pre-selected. Ideally have it to hand and insert and finish yourself. 
  • or have a provisional booking for framing at the framer you usually use
Framing Advice
  • Frames or stretchers should be sufficiently substantial to withstand mirror plating with 12mm (size 6) screws. (If they are too thin (width or depth), the mirror screws will split them)
  • Artists are advised to use plain, simple framing. 
  • Metal frames, unprotected glass edges and clip frames are inadmissible. 
  • All fixtures and fittings must be removed.
My framing advice is to 
  • use contemporary wood frames in white, light wood or a light neutral colour (i.e. enhances the artwork rather than dominates it)
  • Black frames can limit your sales (I won't allow black frames in my home!) - even more so if they are thick black frames 
  • Never ever use gilt. Gilt frames and liners stopped being popular many years ago.
REFERENCE

How much does it cost to enter?

If you have to think about cost, first check out the cost of delivering your artwork to London!

My advice to those submitting via the open entry is to submit just one - and make it a stunner!
  • non-refundable submission fee of £22 per work - for up to six artworks (i.e. £132)
  • for artists aged 35 or under this drops to £14.50 per work 
The submission fee includes free admission to the exhibition (normally £6).

Submission fees support the not-for-profit programme at Mall Galleries. 
The gallery is home to visual arts charity, the Federation of British Artists (Registered Charity Number 200048).

REFERENCE


Website: https://www.newenglishartclub.co.uk/
Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/NewEnglishArt/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/newenglishart/
X: https://x.com/newenglishart

My past blog posts about past exhibitions can be found below
In these you can see LOTS AND LOTS of images of the various exhibitions
    Posted by Making A Mark on Sunday, March 15, 2026
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