Eastern and Western religious iconography, autobiography, and history inform Richard Cleaver’s ceramic sculptures. After building his figures, the Baltimore-based artist carves into the clay and uses oil paint, gold leaf, and semi-precious stones to embellish their surfaces. The forms reinterpret earlier traditions of ritual statuary with narratives that come from Cleaver’s life and dreams. Ares, God of War is the artist’s response to a disturbing nightmare of war, death, and destruction. Wasps hover around the figure’s flame-covered torso like military aircraft, while secret compartments open up to reveal skulls and a scene of three men fighting—a contrast to the orderly images of soldiers at the hands and feet of the main figure.