Stone Sculpture

“My art is an experiment with the induction of attention and presence for the alteration to higher dimensional morphology.”

Needham’s favored sculpture media are wood, alabaster, and installations.

The wood sculptures of Claude Needham are reminiscent of the early Cubist masters in France and Germany as well as some of the smaller works of Henry Moore. Needham uncovers forms that are inherent in the raw woods which come to him.

His sculptures are three-dimensional in form but convey strong overtones of non-visual perceptions. They are an invitation to touch, sense and feel the compassionate mood that is unique to the process that takes place in his studio: the liberation of inherent forms from neglected material. He calls his technique: “Direct carving, with a hand guided by adoration of the piece—the veiled inner form. ”

The same process of “redemption” of found objects that tend to remain unnoticed to the ordinary vision applies to the installation art of Claude Needham—an old flatiron, a ball-and-chain, indefinable pieces of iron from the early industrial age, anthropo- morphic fragments assembled from the discards of daily life—the makings of a post-industrial sculpture.

The aesthetic of Needham’s oeuvre frequently touches worlds that are as alien as Lovecraft’s tales of the underworld. Startling horror lingers on the edge of the confrontable, but there is always a balancing dash of humor. A Solomon’s Ring that he uses to get through to his more startling piece is: “You can’t change what it is, but you can learn to like it.”