Little is known about the maker of this almost 100-year-old guitar other than that its origin is almost certainly American. The maker’s name itself, of course, goes back much further, to the myths of ancient Greece in which Orpheus is the greatest musician and singer—able to charm not just people with his wonderful voice and mastery of the harp-like stringed instrument, the lyre—but animals, rocks, trees and even the gods themselves. In the legendary Greek story, when Jason and the Argonauts set off in search of the golden fleece, the musician went with them and it is Orpheus who sings to the crew to distract them from the irresistible beauty and seductive voices of the Sirens who otherwise would lure the seafarers to their deaths on the jagged rocks of their island.

Contemporary artist and surfer Kevin Ancell conjures a myth of his own making in the artwork that decorates this guitar. On the top and sides, he illustrates a story of romance and seduction as a young Hawaiian man pursues a young Hawaiian woman between the coconut palms and down to the beach. The two then go surfing together. Ultimately they make love in the gentle breakers of—where else?—romantic Waikiki. On the back of the guitar, Ancell illustrates a traditional hula dancer, reminding us that it was in the songs and gestures of the dance that ancient Hawaiians told and retold their own myths and legends down through generations that had no written language.

The entire body of this instrument, and its artwork, has been painstakingly veneered by Ancell with wafer-thin appliqués of shell—green ripple and paua abalone—giving it a luminous effect that shimmers and shifts as the observer views it from different angles of the light.