Tee-art

May 10, 2009 - 8:17 PM by Jessica · 1 Comment
Filed under: Art, Business, General, Israeliness, design

tmarket At one time, a cool Israeli tee-shirt meant heading to Lord Kitsch to select one with the Coca-Cola, Bazooka or a favorite sports team emblem emblazoned in Hebrew across the front, with one’s name in Hebrew ironed on across the back. Or, for the truly daring, a pyramid of Rashi-like script that included more profane language. (Not something this good yeshiva girl ever thought about buying.)

But as with so many other things, those days are long gone, replaced by a much cooler, hipper collection of tee-shirts made, seemingly, by primarily young guys who are also opening boutique tee-shirt stores across the nation. That collection came together on Friday and Saturday at Jerusalem’s HaMaabada space, when the annual T:Market peddled its wide collection of t-shirt makers and their friends — young clothing and jewelry designers — from far and wide. That is, not just from Jerusalem, as this is a countrywide affair.

The crowd was young, the shirts were mostly clever and funny and the mood was very upbeat, possibly due to the weekend timing and centrally-located bar selling beer and mixed drinks, even though it was only 11:00 am.

But what’s great about this new generation of tees and tee-makers is that their slogans are spot-on and funny, poking fun at a whole range of Israeli cultural idioms, from the army (think desk clerks) and the government to food penchants (think hummus, pickles and tomatoes), the Muppets (what is it about Israelis and the Muppet Show?), and a strong bent toward retro designs, which for this crowd means cassette tapes and Pac-Man.

The prices were decent, about NIS 50 and up per tee, not including the NIS 10 entrance fee, although that’s somewhat steep for the student crowd, as I was reminded by one of my younger friends. And as with any kind of Israeli gathering, while the mood was hip and carefree or sought to be, people with baby carriages were welcome and more than one stall operator offered to hold one or both of my boys while I tried on shirts.

So if you missed the Tel Aviv, Haifa and Jerusalem T:Markets, never fear. There’s another one coming up in Beersheva on May 20-21. Start planning now…

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