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Grateful Dead 1966 "Skeleton & Roses" Concert Poster FD-26 Graded 9.6 and Signed

Currency:USD Category:Memorabilia Start Price:28,000.00 USD Estimated At:60,000.00 - 90,000.00 USD
Grateful Dead 1966  Skeleton & Roses  Concert Poster FD-26 Graded 9.6 and Signed
Buyer's Premium Per Lot: This auction is subject to a Buyer's Premium of 25% on the first $300,000 (minimum $49), plus 20% of any amount between $300,000 and $3,000,000, plus 12.5% of any amount over $3,000,000 per lot.
Grateful Dead 1966 "Skeleton Roses" Concert Poster FD-26 Graded 9.6 and Signed by Stanley Mouse.A summer 1966 first printing of the famous Grateful Dead "Skeleton Roses" FD-26 Family Dog San Francisco concert poster featuring the best of both worlds: a CGC grading of 9.6 andsigned by legendary poster artist Stanley Mouse.

Poster collectors almost always have to settle for one or the other: a top-level mint grading in the 9's, or a specimen that's been signed by one of San Francisco's famous "big five" psychedelic poster artists of the 1960's. So to get one of these first-printing masterpieces signed by Mouse andgraded in the 9's is a marvelous coup. It's even in the rarified air abovenine-and-a-half... absolutely straight mint. Just a stunning piece.

First the basics: this poster was printed to advertise two nights of concerts on Friday and Saturday night, Sept. 16 and 17, 1966 at the legendary Avalon Ballroom at Sutter and Van Ness streets in the city by the bay. Oxford Circle was the opening act. "Mouse Studios 66" is credited as the artist (both Mouse and Alton Kelley), and "The Bindweed Press, San Francisco" is the printer. Tickets were sold in the city itself, including the Psychedelic Shop in Haight-Ashbury and Discount Records in North Beach, plus hip locations in Sausalito, Berkeley and Menlo Park.

How seminal was this time in the band's history? Well, just two weeks later their first Warner Bros. recording contract was drawn up. And three weeks after these shows, LSD would become illegal in California... but at this moment, you couldn't be busted for it. Imagine the freedom!

For poster collectors, rock-music fans, pop culture historians, art lovers and just the curious with a good sense of taste, this poster checks every box. The Grateful Dead. San Francisco. The mid-60's. Unforgettable artwork. Legendary graphic artists. Charisma. Colors. Rarity. In a mint 9.6 condition grading. What more could one possibly ask for?

This artistic stroke of genius marked the very first appearance of the skeleton roses iconography in Grateful Dead lore, a legendary motif which still shines brightly 55 years later. Just a month earlier, their Avalon appearance was advertised on a Family Dog poster by depicting... a stoned Frankenstein. Huh?

Second printings and reproductions of FD-26 abound, but this is the only printing of this poster done in the summer of 1966 for the sole purpose of exciting patrons enough to buy tickets and attend one of the two nights. It's almost a surreal thought to us now, but that's the whole reason this thing exists... it was strictly an advertisingpiece. Any subsequent print run was done for the purpose of making money off the beautiful artwork. But this specimen was printed solely to herd as many people as possible into Chet Helms' second-story Avalon Ballroom. This was a year before the summer of love in San Francisco, when things were still pretty innocent.

This poster's popularity and value is soaring like a piece of fine European art. It's well-known by now that in November 2019, Heritage broke the world record for any psychedelic concert poster ever sold at auction by landing $118,750 for this poster in graded 9.8 condition. (Unsigned, we might add.) Last summer we sold Family Dog co-owner Bob Cohen's standard Very Good condition specimen for $38,750. Very Good, un-CGC-graded and unsigned! This masterpiece has truly turned into the psychedelic concert poster of the decade, that everyone wants and are collectively going to the wall for.

So the lucky winning bidder will have trophy for their walls that might likely be handed down in their family for generations to come, as the best piece of 20th-century psychedelic art that was ever created, in wonderful, certified condition and containing the signature of the poster's lead designer, Stanley Mouse of Mouse Studios.

Oh, and the Dead's music being played that weekend was pretty good, too.

Poster measures 14 1/8" x 19 7/8" and is graded 9.6 by CGC (Certified Guaranty Company). COA from Heritage Auctions.

Literature: See Grushkin, Paul, The Art of Rock: Posters from Presley to Punk, Abbeville Press, New York, 1987, p.97 (illus.).