The paralysed woman who paints with her mind

A WOMAN left paralysed by a degenerative illness is to hold an exhibition of extraordinary paintings she created using only the power of thought.

Heide Pfützner has learned to paint using a computer that reads her thoughts. Picture: Hemedia

Heide Pfützner can only communicate using her eyes and cannot move, speak or breathe unaided after being struck down by a devastating form of Motor Neurone Disease.

Yet she has been able to create dozens of colourful abstract paintings using new computer technology which she controls with her brain. The former teacher has mastered the BrainPainting device and uses thought to control a palette of colours, shapes and brushes.

She is to show her work for the first time at an exhibition called Brain on Fire on the island of Easdale, near Oban.

Heide Pfützner has learned to paint using a computer that reads her thoughts. Picture: Hemedia

Yesterday Heide, from Leipzig, Germany, said her diagnosis of Motor Neurone Disease, which is also known as Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS), had been a “personal catastrophe”.

But the new technology has reignited her passion for painting, adding: “This project gives me the opportunity to show the world ALS has not been the end of my life.”

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