1. T-Shirt Printing As Fine Art and Protest Medium
The printed t-shirts you wear with pride has come a long way from as a simple undergarment
worn by soldiers around the battlefields with the two World Wars. Today, you can find this
little bit of clothing reflecting the sparkle of flashes on a Paris catwalk and drenched with a
water cannon on some street protest somewhere.
Tested in war, immortalized by heroes
Ancestors in the t-shirt will be in almost every culture. The clothing we realize today, though,
is believed to become a direct descendant of the undershirt worn by soldiers from dating
back the First World War. According to one story, American soldiers adopted the t-shirt from
the lightweight cotton undershirts with their European counterparts. By World War II, the t-
shirt was the typical issue upper undergarment for soldiers with the United States.
After the Second World War, veterans begun to appear in public wearing only their t-shirts as
a possible upper garment. It was only in the 1950s, though, in the event the t-shirt jumped
towards the public's consciousness after icons like Marlon Brando, John Wayne, and James
Dean began wearing this in public places. Dean's sudden death cemented the t-shirt's image
as cultural icon around it did the actor himself, especially since he wore a t-shirt prominently
in Rebel Without a Cause.
Symbol and canvass
The t-shirt rose to cultural prominence in the peak of 1960s counterculture. With the adoption
of screenprinting, it now became feasible for printed t-shirts with a specific design being
manufactured in bulk. T-shirt printing became a rewarding business as musicians and
athletes jumped in to the bandwagon with custom printed t-shirts.

3. The invention of more strategies to decorating t-shirts in succeeding decades solidified its
role being a medium of self-expression, especially inside 1980s. Digital design and printing in
the late 1990s as well as the early twenty-first century gave people more ways to use the t-
shirt as being a canvass for ideas and images. Several artists like Bill Beckley and Peter
Klashorst utilize garment as being a medium for their own make of artistry.
Corporations also saw the potential of the t-shirt, now being an excellent medium for
advertising campaigns. Although there were instances from the t-shirt as marketing tool
during earlier decades, it turned out only inside the 1990s that corporations started putting
their logos and campaign slogans on t-shirts. T-shirts became an inexpensive way to get
additional money away from fans and loyal customers.
Political movements and non-governmental organizations also used printed t-shirts for his or
her own campaigns. Putting one's slogan on printed t-shirts has got the same effect being a
raised placard, except that it threatens people less and turns into a fashion statement. One in
the best examples could be the Che Guevara shirts.
Today printed t-shirts are standard attire anywhere inside the globe, in the corporate
boardrooms of New York for an unmarked beach in Thailand. No matter how it really is worn,
you may never get it wrong with t-shirts.