art by john van hamersveld, process color
Most of his paintings were set on the beach. His surfers were elongated, wavy-limbed, and often featureless, and their boards looked like bent daggers. Sometimes the ocean and sky were faithfully rendered in the usual surf-world blues, greens, and whites, but
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coastline. Soon many of the world’s most notable plein air painters took up residency on the California coast to paint, among other things, the windswept and sun-drenched beaches, coves, bluffs, and surf. So began the California Plein Air Movement. The California Art Club was founded in 1909 by painters such as Franz A. Bischoff and William Wendt, who memorialized the pristine landscapes and coastlines surrounding Los Angeles in the early 20th century and set a high standard for future California painters. Other artists, such as Edgar Payne, whose work is forever linked with Western America, became permanent residents and exhibited their works of the California coast to a world audience. The seascapes created by these and other early club members are among the world’s finest. In the same year that the California Art Club was founded, railroad magnate Henry Huntington brought a man named George Freeth to Southern California from Hawaii. Huntington wanted to show off Freeth’s skills of “walking on water” after he witnessed him surfing in Waikiki. A group of impressed beach boys adopted the activity, and, for these early pioneers of the sport, it soon became a lifestyle. Competitions were established along the California coast in the 1920s and ’30s and its popularity took off. After World War II surfing became a counterculture youth movement, luring its followers into the surf as active participants and no longer just casual observers. Days at the beach became the most sought-after commodity. This surf culture was celebrated in the ’50s and ’60s through film, music, and television: Bruce Brown’s 1964 hit film Endless Summer changed the way the world viewed surfers, and surf music as its own genre was pioneered by Dick Dale and later exploited by bands such as The Beach Boys, one of the most commercially successful bands of all time. The founding father of “surf media,” John Severson, earned a master’s degree in art education in 1957 and set out to document his experiences and the world that surrounded him—the beach, the surfers, and the waves. He created cartoons, woodblock prints, paintings and films. Surf culture and history writer Matt Warsaw writes:
George Freeth (1883–1919) came to California in 1907 from Hawaii and brought with him the sport of surfing, or, as his sponsor called it, “walking on water.”
Seal Beach Locals by John Severson The Beach Boys had their first hit in 1963 with “Surfin’ USA,” and went on to become one of the most commercially successful bands of all time. They were inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1988.
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