Description
Part of a recently discovered treasure trove of screenprinted tees that were created for me 30+ years ago. I have created several versions of the “Captain Cracker” and the “Polly” versions over the decades. The one on this shirt was among my earliest – and the original artwork was black and white, created with pen and ink. At the time, a young person contacted and partnered with me to produce a very small screenprint run of three of my bird designs on Hanes Beefy Teeshirts. I received a portion of the overall run. He sold/distributed his portion but art shows at that time would not allow selling tshirts. Web commerce was still in its infancy so I had no real outlet and just stored them away. My wife has recently opened an Etsy shop and sells tshirts along with other items. I remembered these tees and pulled them out thinking she might like to include them in her shop. However, she encouraged me to instead make them available here on my website, since I would have the opportunity to “showcase” them a bit by wearing them around.
Even though the shirts looked great and were safely packed in individual clear bags, out of an abundance of caution we washed and pressed them to be sure the fabric and the image remained in perfect condition. And they are! I kept two of the shirts for myself. I wore them to my most recent art show here in Texas and they got lots of fun comments. The shirts are soft, comfortable, have a nice “heft/weight” and are well made. I am truly excited to make these available. Only very limited sizes and quantities are available for each design and once they are gone – that’s it!
While the later, colorful versions of these characters are great fun, I have a deep personal fondness for my black and white designs. Pen and ink provides an emphasis to their character that is different from my color works. Penwork HAS to stand on its own – and that makes a difference in the overall impact of the artwork.
