An exceedingly rare 1964 first-printing silk-screened poster for Bruce Brown’s legendary surf documentary The Endless Summer.  This 40” x 60” Day-Glo classic was designed by John Van Hamersveld, who has signed this example at the bottom.

This is the earliest version of this classic poster, from the initial pre-distribution run, silk-screened by Eric Askew in a garage in Costa Mesa, California. Original printings of this poster are exceptionally rare, and in the permanent collections of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History, the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

The first printing posters date from the film’s early, pre-national-distribution run. Brown initially toured The Endless Summer as a live-narrated presentation, showing the film at school auditoriums and similar venues across the country.

After Hollywood studio distributors rejected the film, Brown rented the Sunset Theater in Wichita, Kansas in January 1964, where moviegoers lined up in snowy weather and the film locally outgrossed My Fair Lady. Brown then rented a theater in New York City, where the film ran successfully for 48 weeks. It was the success of that New York run that led Cinema V to pick up the film for national distribution — notably insisting that neither the film nor the poster be changed. Upon national release on June 15, 1966, The Endless Summer grossed $5 million domestically and over $20 million worldwide, against a production budget of just $50,000.

Van Hamersveld’s design is one of the most widely reproduced poster images of the 1960s — and arguably of the twentieth century. Surf historian Matt Warshaw has called it the most recognizable piece of pop art this side of Warhol. Within just a few years of its creation, a New York poster company was mass-producing reproductions for poster shops and college bookstores across the country, and the image has since been reproduced on virtually every format imaginable, from metal signs to drink coasters. It remains a dorm room staple more than sixty years after its creation.

The poster offered here is not one of those countless later reproductions — it is an original, first-version silk-screened example from the initial pre-distribution run, and the rarest and most sought-after version in existence.

In 1964, Van Hamersveld — then a student at the Art Center College of Design and art director of Surfer magazine — was hired by Brown to create the poster. He organized a photo session with Brown and the film’s two stars, Mike Hynson and Robert August, at Salt Creek Beach in Dana Point, California. Working from a photograph taken by Bob Bagley, Brown’s general manager and cameraman, Van Hamersveld transformed the silhouetted image of the three figures against a setting sun into a neon masterpiece of 1960s graphic design, hand-lettering the title himself. He was paid $150 for what would become one of the most iconic poster images in American visual culture.

The film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress in 2002 as being “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant,” and is widely credited with introducing surfing to a mainstream audience and giving birth to the global surf-and-travel culture that endures to this day.

The poster is in Very Good+ condition, and has been dry-mounted to a foam core backing.  John Van Hamersveld has signed it in pencil below ‘Bruce Brown Films’; his very large signature measures 19” across, and is dated ‘84’.  There are minor ink losses to the Day-Glow image that could easily be touched up, but we have chosen to leave the poster as-is.  On the bottom edge is what looks like a small tape stain at the midpoint, to the right of that a 2” closed tear, a small paper chip, and some creasing, all of which can be seen in the close up images. The corners are all lightly dinged.  None of these issued detracts significantly from the impact of this very impressive poster.

A truly museum quality surfing collectible.

Note: Because of the very large size of this poster, shipping is $300. within the United States and $1300. Internationally.