Sea Monster Stirrup Cups

Sea Monster Stirrup Cups is an ongoing series, currently nine vessels, rooted in my fascination with historical metalwork and the mysterious creatures that populate early cartographic imagination. The stirrup cup is defined by its distinctive footless form and its role as a greeting or parting vessel offered to riders while their feet remained in the stirrups of the saddle. Typically shaped as animal heads and constructed through hammering and chasing techniques, these cups once marked thresholds: moments of welcome, departure, ritual, and camaraderie.

When starting this series, I turned to the fantastical “sea monsters” that decorate Medieval and Renaissance maps. These chimeric creatures positioned at the edges of the known world embodied both fear and imagination, personifying the unknown and the misunderstood. They occupied the places where fact dissolved into speculation, standing in for the vast uncertainties of the ocean and the limits of human knowledge. These monsters are simultaneously warnings, inventions, and narrative tools; they reveal a deeply human impulse to create forms that articulate our fears, questions, and curiosities when we encounter unfamiliar territory.