Paintings have been hanging on hospital walls for years but the idea of involving patients in creating their own pieces is still quite new.

Health Correspondent Barry Nelson visits a novel art project at the region's largest cancer treatment centre.

CANCER patient John Scott can't help smiling when he talks about his new-found passion. He'd always fancied taking up a paintbrush when he was younger but the last thing he expected when he began a gruelling 30-week cycle of chemotherapy treatment at Newcastle General Hospital was to be introduced to the art of painting on silk.

"This might sound odd but I'm trying to think of a reason to come back here when my treatment stops. I look forward to it every Friday, I've been coming since May," says the 63-year-old from Ashington, Northumberland. "I've never done anything like this before, I'm definitely going to keep it up."

John is just one of hundreds of cancer patients awaiting treatment at the Northern Centre for Cancer Treatment (NCCT) who have benefited from an unusual arts project.

Every Thursday and Friday for the last year, textile artists Ali Rhind and Rachel Phillimore have been showing patients how to make traditional rag rug "clippy mats". This artform, known on Tyneside as "proggy and hooky", involves turning old textiles into wall hangings and other three-dimensional forms.

By bringing their work into the busy setting of the radiotherapy waiting room and chemotherapy day unit of the NCCT, the aim is to attract curious patients who often join in. Elsewhere in the unit, painter and printmaker Marcia Ley shows patients how to paint, etch glass and work with silk.

When The Northern Echo visited the project, cancer patient Beth Sharrard was happily filling in time, while she waited to be called through for radiotherapy, by working at a half-completed rag rug.

"I was brought up with clippy mats and proggy mats so it brings back a lot of happy memories," says Beth, 60, who works at the hospital as a domestic. "It is interesting to do because when you come here for treatment you are all tensed up inside. You need something to take your mind off why you here and this seems to do the trick."

Alongside her, working at one of her superb textile creations, is nationally recognised artist Ali Rhind. It was a meeting between Ali and Christine McGreal, now acting directorate manager of the NCCT, seven years ago that provided the spark for the current project. Christine heard about Ali's work through a cancer support group in Sunderland.

After a meeting with Ali at the home of North-East cancer care counsellor and artist Mary Jennings, Christine was convinced of the value of art therapy in a hospital setting. Christine subsequently introduced Ali and Mary to Germaine Stanger, arts advisor to the Newcastle Hospitals Trust.

"What she showed me was fantastic, She told me about proggy mats, which you don't usually think of as works of art and suggested an artist-in-residence programme. It was so radical I couldn't imagine it was possible," says Germaine.

But the germ of an idea was planted and to Ali and Mary's delight the project eventually got underway in February 2001 in the radiotherapy outpatients waiting room.

Funding for this initial residency came from a Northern Arts Lottery award and from Newcastle City Council. More cash from Tyne and Wear Health Action Zone (part of the Common Knowledge project funded by Newcastle City Council) funded an artists' workshop for writer Bernadette Higgins, painter Val Close and assistant Jane Swaile in the chemotherapy day ward.

Since April this year the project - dubbed Room for You - has benefited from an additional two-year £100,000 grant from a variety of sources, including the Regional Arts Lottery Fund, Northern Rock Foundation, Newcastle Healthcare Charity, Newcastle City Council and Newcastle and North Tyneside Health Authority.

Germaine says the work with clippy mats has been particularly popular with patients. "Many patients will have memories of this artform. They have pleasant associations of when they were young," she says.

Apart from the weekly sessions by artists and patients the project has left an eye-catching legacy on the hospital's walls. Work created by patients now hangs alongside specially commissioned work by professional artists.

Christine, head of treatment and imaging at the NCTT, has no doubt of the value of the art project.

"When the artists are in the waiting area, the atmosphere changes. They generate activity, energy, laughter and dialogue. The staff recognise the positive changes that the project brings to the patients' experience of waiting and providing them with the opportunity to discuss their concerns if they wish."

Ali, who is based at the Ouseburn Building in Byker, saw the opportunity for introducing art to patients during her own experience as a patient waiting for treatment. "When you are involved in long-term treatment, you can feel a bit like hospital property and experience a sense of anonymity when spending lengthy periods of time in the waiting room," she says.

The Room for You project provides patients and their carers "with a companionable environment to engage in conversation," she adds.

Christine says the recent refurbishment of waiting and treatment areas at the General has also helped to lift the mood for patients. "Before the changes it was ghastly, grubby, out-of-date and tired," she adds.

Another plus point from the art project has been the production of a large mural which gives patients information about the different treatment pathways they will follow during their visit to the unit. Actual members of staff are pictured in the mural, including Dr Trevor Roberts, clinical director of the NCTT. "From a staff morale point of view this has been a lot of fun," says Germaine.

On the back of the Room for You project the hospital is about to begin a major research project into the effects of art therapy.

Some patients have become so absorbed by learning a new skill they almost resent being interrupted when their turn to be treated comes.

"I was watching this guy working on a rag rug when he said 'I hope they don't shout me through, I'm enjoying this too much'," laughs Germaine.