Carol Cooper Garey and her husband, Ira Garey, plan to participate in an art event at Sunstone Healing Center for people touched by cancer .

James Gregg / Arizona daily star

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For East Side resident Linda Yost, an upcoming art day at a retreat center near her home combines her two greatest passions: Art, and helping those touched by cancer.

Yost, who enjoys painting with watercolors, has been a volunteer at the Sunstone Healing Center since it opened five years ago, and before that volunteered helping cancer patients at Tucson Medical Center.

Yost, 67, is also a survivor of breast cancer.

It's been nearly 17 years since she was diagnosed and then found cancer-free.

"I had surgeries followed with six months of chemo," she said. "I've been clear ever since."

Sunstone will host Lilly Oncology on Canvas, an international art competition that includes original works by cancer survivors, their families and friends, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. June 2 at the center, 2545 N. Woodland Road.

The program started three years ago. Completed pieces may be submitted for an international competition, and the winning pieces will be part of an exhibit displayed at locations around the world.

Eli Lilly and Co., a pharmaceutical company, will provide the art materials and supplies at Sunstone, near Tanque Verde Road and Catalina Highway.

Sunstone offers services for people affected by cancer and their family members and friends. In addition to its retreat center, Sunstone services are offered in several area hospitals.

Hidden away on 14 acres of mesquite bosques, Sunstone's retreat center originally was a guest ranch built in the late 19th century.

Yost runs a family support group there called "Living with Hope." She said it's most rewarding when she sees people find that there can be life after a cancer diagnosis.

"I find it very rewarding when they can turn it around and get past the diagnosis and ultimately survive this journey," she said.

Sunstone's executive director, Patricia Harmon, said this is the first time the art competition has been held in Arizona.

"We are inviting cancer-survivor artists to come even if they don't want to join in the competition," she said, adding that people who don't consider themselves to be artists are also invited to participate.

Harmon said there is plenty of space at the healing center for people to branch out and find a place to reflect, and draw or paint.

"We're inviting cancer survivors, their loved ones, nurses, anyone who is in the field of oncology," she said.

People who are interested in attending need to make a reservation so enough supplies can be on hand.

Artists Carol Cooper Garey and her husband, Ira, are both cancer survivors who plan to attend.

"I'm a breast cancer survivor as of this past April," Garey said. Her husband has myeloma, a rare form of cancer that attacks the plasma cells in the bone marrow and affects about 15,000 people a year.

After being diagnosed with breast cancer in December, a recurrence from five years earlier, Garey had a mastectomy.

Garey, 69, is looking forward to the upcoming art event at Sunstone.

"I like to draw and paint and I feel that art is very therapeutic," she said.

Garey was a volunteer at Sunstone before cancer touched her life directly.

"It was ironic that I would get involved on the level of both survivor and caregiver," she said.

After her husband's diagnosis, Garey went on to become the leader of the myeloma support group at Sunstone.

"I have been an advocate of Sunstone since I first moved here," she said. "Then, when my husband was diagnosed in '04, I became even more involved through the support group."

Ira Garey, 73, does pottery and ceramics.

Carol Garey said the outlook for people with myeloma is a lot better than it was 20 years ago. At that time, she said, people were expected to live about three years. Now there are people in remission "upwards of seven or eight years."

"My husband fortunately is one of those people," she said. "He's now three years into the disease."