ARTWORK BY CHICAGO ARTIST
ACCEPTED BY MDA ART COLLECTION
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"ST3-63 & me" |
TUCSON, Ariz., Dec. 16, 2003 — A digital creation
by Kenneth M. Jasch a Chicago software/hardware training manager has
been accepted by the Muscular Dystrophy Association’s Art
Collection. Now in its 12th year, the Collection features artwork
by people from across the country with neuromuscular diseases.
“ST3-63 & me” depicts the stages of the launch of the
ST3-63 Discovery space shuttle in 1995, which Jasch attended. He took
photographs of the night launch, then scanned them into his computer
and enhanced them using filters and other digital art techniques.
Jasch designs, develops and executes technical software/hardware and
manages training. In addition, he has a Web site development business
at www.kenjasch.com. As an artist,
Jasch has won awards for his hand-detailed models of NASA’s Apollo
and Gemini spacecraft.
Jasch, 39, has spinal
muscular atrophy, which affects the part of the nervous system that
controls voluntary muscle movement. SMA causes weakness in the legs,
hips, shoulders and arms. Jasch, a member of MDA’s National Task
Force on Public Awareness from 1994 to 1996, has made frequent appearances
on the Chicago broadcast of the Jerry Lewis MDA Labor Day Telethon.
“We’re deeply honored to welcome Ken Jasch’s work
into the permanent MDA Art Collection,” MDA President & CEO
Robert Ross said. “His contribution to our Collection will undoubtedly
delight all who see it as it travels to galleries and museums as part
of special exhibits of the Collection.”
The new addition by Jasch will be displayed at MDA’s national
headquarters in Tucson, Ariz. It will also 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 comprises some 300 works by artists aged 2
to 82 and represents all 50 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; JFK Center at Vanderbilt
University, Nashville, Tenn.; Fresno Metropolitan Museum; Duluth Art
Institute; Capital 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
clinics for adults and children affected by neuromuscular diseases in
the Chicago area at Northwestern Memorial Hospital, Rush-Presbyterian-Saint
Luke’s Medical Center and University of Chicago Hospitals in Chicago.
The Association’s programs are funded almost entirely by individual
private contributors.
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