Artist Peter back behind easel after rare tumour
After recovering from a rare tumour, an artist is glad to be back outside behind his easel painting the great outdoors.
Peter Tudhope, 53, of Forehill, has been setting up his easel at Rozelle Park- rain, hail or shine- to paint after a long recovery from an acoustic neuroma tumour, which unbeknownst to him had been growing for 20 years.
Acoustic neuroma is a rare noncancerous tumour which affects the hearing and balance nerves in the inner ear.
Peter, who went to three art schools, was diagnosed in 2017 and was told he was just months away from having a fatal stroke.
The dad-of-two said: “I went to the doctor to see about my elbow and I was almost out the door when he asked me ‘is there anything else while you’re here?’
“I said ‘well sometimes I feel a bit dizzy when I’m playing football- I don’t know if that’s just me getting old’.
“It took months to get a consultant. He sent me for an MRI scan only because that doctor I’d visited had written down this ‘acoustic neuroma’.
“It was a Saturday night and I didn’t look at my phone until 1am and basically they said ‘get into the hospital now’.
“I went the next morning but basically was told I had a few months to go and then I was going to take this massive fatal stroke.
“Which was crazy. I’d been so fit and healthy all my life.”
After his operation in early 2018, Peter is now deaf in his left ear and has nerve damage to his face.
He said: “I’ve only got one balance bone now on the right-hand side so it’s doing the work of both sides.
“Trying to get back on my feet was a slow process.
“Walking and exercise was a massive thing for my recovery.
“But getting out drawing and painting at the times where I’ve been able to during the lockdown has been fantastic because it’s a mental thing for me and my recovery as well as the physical.
“For me to get outside now is a release of life again.
“It’s something that I wondered in my recovery process whether I would ever do again.
“Whether it’s been hailstone or rain I’ve been out working in that weather down at Rozelle. I’ve got about 10 layers on!”
Peter’s best advice for anyone taking up painting or drawing during lockdown is to “work from life”.
He added: “A lot of people work from
photographs and you’ve only got one aspect within a photograph and it can literally be copied.
“Work from life whether it’s still life,
figures, your mum doing her knitting at home.
“People look at photographs and there’s a nice memory about it but there’s nothing
quite like having your children or father or mother drawing the family.
“They will be cherished even more than photographs.”