SELF-PORTRAIT BY NASHVILLE ARTIST
ACCEPTED BY MDA ART COLLECTION

"Breathtaking Metamorphosis" - by Erin B. Worsham

TUCSON, Ariz., July 19, 2001 - A self-portrait by Erin Brady Worsham of Nashville, Tenn., has been accepted by the Muscular Dystrophy Association's Art Collection. The Collection features artwork by people from across the country with neuromuscular diseases.

Worsham's "Breathtaking Metamorphosis" depicts the artist as a butterfly kite being flown by her husband, Curry, as their son, Daniel, looks on. The vision is designed as a metaphor, illustrating the artist's newfound freedom as a result of using a ventilator for breathing assistance.

The piece is an example of digital design, or computer art. It illustrated an article by Worsham in the June issue of MDA's national magazine, Quest. The article, about her experience of having a tracheostomy and adjusting to using mechanical ventilation, was titled "Life on the Vent: The Other Side of the Mountain."

Worsham, 42, is affected by amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS, also known as Lou Gehrig's disease), a progressive disease that causes the disintegration of motor neurons, resulting in the weakening of voluntary, or skeletal, muscles.

Worsham is a former actress, singer and dancer who was honored as MDA's 1999 Tennessee State Personal Achievement Award recipient. She studied at Nashville's Watkins Art Institute where she received several awards. After the disabilities imposed by ALS made working in other media impossible, she discovered computer art. She operates her computer with a sensor attached to an eyebrow.

"We're honored to have such a wonderfully evocative image by Erin Worsham in the permanent MDA Art Collection," said MDA President Robert Ross. "Her contribution to our Collection will undoubtedly amaze and move all who see it as it travels to galleries and museums as part of special exhibits of the Collection."

The new addition by Worsham will be exhibited at MDA's national headquarters in Tucson, Ariz., and will be included in MDA Art Collection traveling exhibits. The Collection was established in 1992 to focus attention on the achievements of artists with disabilities, and to emphasize that physical disability is no barrier to creativity.

The permanent Collection currently comprises more than 260 works by artists ages 2 to 82 and represents 48 states. Each artist is affected by one of the neuromuscular diseases in the MDA program.

Selected art from the Collection has been exhibited at the Dallas Museum of Art; Cork Gallery at Lincoln Center and Forbes Magazine Galleries in New York; Tucson Museum of Art; Bishop Museum in Honolulu; Chicago Public Library, Harold Washington Library Center; Fort Lauderdale Museum of Art; Los Angeles Children's Museum; University of California-Berkeley and Fresno Metropolitan Museum; Duluth Art Institute; Capitol Children's Museum, Washington, D.C.; and the Henry Ford Centennial Library in Dearborn, Mich.

MDA is a voluntary health agency working to defeat neuromuscular diseases through programs of worldwide research, comprehensive services, and far-reaching professional and public health education. MDA maintains a clinic for area adults and children affected by neuromuscular diseases at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville.

The Association's programs are funded almost entirely by individual private contributors.