Bob's passion for painting becomes fund raiser for Clatterbridge Cancer Charity

Posted 16th December 2016

Patient Bob Martin has turned his passion for painting into fund raising for The Clatterbridge Cancer Charity.

Bob had to give up his hill walking hobby following surgery for bowel cancer so there was a void in his life.

Now he is a keen painter and exhibiting his work in his home town St Helens.

The retired lorry driver, 73, had never had any interest in art before his diagnosis in 2010.

He underwent radiotherapy at The Clatterbridge Cancer Centre before an operation at Whiston Hospital.

He climbed his last mountain before his treatment started and was wondering how he would fill his days after recovering from the surgery.

Thanks to the cancer support group in St Helens he is now a budding artist.

Bob said: “I made a good friend through the group and was helping her move some stuff from her house. She had some old paints and brushes. I thought ‘I might give that a go’ and it just started there.

“I went from acrylics to oil paintings and it has just carried on from there. I used to do hill walking. I was able to climb a mountain in around four or five hours but then it started taking seven or eight, I was really tired. It was after that I was diagnosed.

“The art started as a hobby but it has really helped me and it fills the gap left by hill walking.”

Bob is showing his work at The World of Glass in St Helens and will donate any profits from sales of his paintings to The Clatterbridge Cancer Charity.

He said: “For me Clatterbridge was brilliant. The staff were wonderful, the nurses, the doctors, everyone.”