WITH everything from a glowing matchstick on a cheap, white chipboard shelf to a seven-hour film show of West Bank Palestinians dancing to western pop music, the British Art Show 6 will bring the cleverest and most contentious contemporary art to the North-East.

The 50 artists, judged to be Britain's best, have been selected to display work at Gateshead's Baltic in an exhibition organised every five years by London's Hayward Gallery.

About 200,000 visitors are expected for the internationally-renowned event, which recognises that 50 per cent of Britain's most talented people are women and that half were born outside these shores.

Now open and running until January 8, the British Art Show also marked the first event of note for the Baltic's new director, Peter Doroshenko.

The US-born boss's first thoughts were for hurricane-threatened friends in Houston, Texas, where he worked for five years and is still a visiting lecturer.

"I've been e-mailing and phoning to keep in touch, but where I've not had an answer I hope it's for the right reasons and that they've gone somewhere safer," he said.

Of the exhibition, Mr Doroshenko said: "I'm learning, just as much as anybody that comes in to the Baltic, about what these young emerging artists are doing because two curators appointed by the Hayward organised the show on our behalf."

He is impressed with the professional approach of Art Show organisers, Baltic staff and artists who put together the exhibition.

Next month, Mr Doroshenko will be announcing the Baltic's follow-up programme to the British Art Show which will recognise the growing strength of North-East artists.

* TV channel Five will feature the Baltic on Tuesday, October 11, at 7.15pm.