John Severson's Surf

John Severson (born 1933), who is said to have revolutionized pop culture's vision of surfing, began his career as a painter and eventually became a writer, photographer, publisher, and filmmaker. Selling his canvases at Long Beach State College in the 1950s, he painted images of Hawaiian and Californian surf culture. In 1958, Severson expanded his repertoire by creating several popular surf movies— Surf Safari , Surf Fever , Big Wednesday , and Pacific Vibrations —and also created posters that advertised these films and persist as collector favorites today. These posters brought to life the surfing scene being depicted in the movies.