Charles cancer diagnosis: Northern Irish art society which counts King as patron wishes him well - and says he's actually pretty good with a brush himself

Grahame Booth, a council member of the roughly 100-strong Ulster Watercolour Society, said people's hearts had gone out to the King after news of his diagnosis emerged on Monday night.

The society (which vets the work of artists before they can join) is one of only two in Northern Ireland which can count the King as its patron – the other being the RUC George Cross Foundation.

Aged 69, Mr Booth has been involved with the society for about 12 years.

"We're saddened to hear of our patron King Charles having problems, and we'll be passing on our best wishes to His Majesty for his speedy recovery," he said.

He described the King as "a keen watercolour artist" who first became patron of the society in 2017.

Thereupon Charles – then the Prince of Wales – loaned two of his own paintings to the society for its annual exhibition in Belfast's Crescent Arts Centre that year.

So... is the King any good?

"He is actually, yes!" replied Mr Booth.

"Watercolour is a tricky medium. Most people would consider watercolour to be the most difficult painting medium because you can't make mistakes.

"If you make mistakes, that's it. In any other medium if you make a mistake you can erase it or cover it up. With watercolour you can't.

"You sort of get one go at it basically and if it doesn't work you get a new bit of paper out and start again.

"Watercolour is the one that's prized for its translucency – the fact it's translucent means you can't cover up mistakes."

Mr Booth added that "we write to him occasionally to let him know what's going on, and get a reply wishing us all the best – but there's hasn't been an opportunity for anything closer than that, and I suppose maybe one reason is he's been fairly busy the last few years".

"The coronation was only earlier within the year," he said.

"Probably after the Queen we were all sort of expecting a nice long period where he'd be free to do what he wanted to do.

"Anybody that you hear of that's diagnosed with cancer, obviously your heart goes out to them because we've all experienced it with family members and things like that.

"It’s just how unfortunate it was, that it's happened so soon into his reign."

Just yesterday Stephen White, chairman of the RUC George Cross Foundation, had told the News Letter: "Since its earliest days our patron has been the then-prince, and now-king.

"He did us the great honour of opening our memorial garden in 2003, and for the last 21 years – including since he became king – he has been very interested in all aspects of the foundation's work: in particular widows, the disabled, and how we're supporting them."

He wished him “a speedy recovery” on behalf of “the wider RUC family", adding: “I was shocked. It seems like no time since myself and three others took part in the Queen's funeral.”