A Southern California company, Catalina created a series of designs with ocean themes. The art was created with separate art for the front and the back panels of the shirt.
This shirt was designed by artist, Jim Tillet whose name is above the Catalina name and logo. Tillet was an artist living in Mexico in the early 1950’s when he created a collection of ocean-themed designs for Catalina’s sportswear divisions.
In 1959 he moved to St. Thomas Island in the Caribbean where he and his wife started an artist commune providing a home for local artists. Their goal was to be an “old world retreat from the stresses of life centered around arts and crafts”.
His ocean themed design were hand-screened with individual screens for the shirt fronts and back panel of the shirt.
The front two panels were printed with one color of seaweed, referred to as “kelp” in California. The kelp cleverly rises out of two pockets with horizontal bars specially printed with three bands of color. The back has a full length graphic of 2 large crabs under a piece of flowing kelp.
This is all printed on a multi-colored, speckled ground. A stand out design created by an accomplished artist.
