Image Not Available

'The Wave Masters' and 'Passing Images'

Date1978

Object number00017315

NamePoster

MediumInk on paper

DimensionsOverall: 512 x 381 mm, 0.022 kg

ClassificationsPosters and postcards

Credit LineANMM Collection Purchased with USA Bicentennial Gift funds

Terms

DescriptionThis promotional poster was printed for the Australian surfing movie 'The Wave Masters' and the short movie 'Passing Images'. The poster features a photo of Australian pro surfer Mark Richards surfing on a twin fin at Merewether Beach, NSW. The photograph was taken by Hugh McLeod of Surfing World Magazine.History'The Wave Masters' was a surf movie produced by Grant Young Grant which featured the Australian professional surfing competition circuit of 1978. 'Passing images' was a short movie which featured the work of four leading surf photographers. Hollywood began producing surf films in the late 1950s as the first generation of post-World War II War baby boomers reached adolescence. Surfing and the beach symbolised the idealism of carefree fun and freedom. Surfing films have been a critical ingredient in the popularity of surfing culture and have helped to popularised surfing and beach fashion. In the 1960s surf art moved off the covers of surfing magazines and onto film poster promoting movies featuring surfers riding large waves in exotic locations. By the 1970s surfing films had shifted from 1960s Hollywood beach party musicals produced for the broader community, to the 'soul-surfing' exploration of counterculture lifestyles. During this era films were either created in a documentary style, which targeted the surfing enthusiast, or as a fictional feature film with the focus on the reality of surfing. Surfing films provide an insight into the surfing lifestyle and have become part of surfing popular culture. They reflect the internationalism of surfing in their content an appeal. Surfing films provide the opportunity to watch talented and often high profile surfers catching waves that every surfer dream about riding.SignificanceThis poster is an example of the types of material produced to promote surfing movies in the 1970s in Australia.