Peter Max, 1937-

By Toby Berryman

Preserve the Environment - EXPO ‘74, 1974, photogravure postage stamps, 41 x 43mm (each)

As the freewheeling 1960s staggered to a close, America’s iconic LIFE Magazine astutely observed that “the mark of [Peter] Max is everywhere” within contemporary society; a sentiment which was only to prove truer as the decades progressed. Max’s pseudo-psychedelic artistic output had come to define the famed ‘hippie aesthetic’ of the United States (and his mass-produced LOVE, 1969, poster covered innumerable dorm-room walls), but his contributions to society extend far wider than his populist, and at times rather gaudy, formal artistic-output.

Somewhat surprisingly, it was Max who helped popularised yoga in the US, Max who designed the first bilingual US-Border signage, Max whose artwork thrice covered the New York City Yellow Pages; and when the world-renowned Statue of Liberty sought economic-support for a major 1986 restoration, it was the Peter Max campaign which secured the necessary funding. He has painted for six US-Presidents (transcending party lines), had his wedding officiated by Mayor Giuliani, and counts Ringo Starr, Mikhail Gorbachev, Taylor Swift, and Aretha Franklin amongst his friends and collaborators. And his commissions remained equally wide ranging. Max designed 600ft of staging for Woodstock ’99, NASCAR-bodywork for Dale Earnhardt, and everything in between, from crockery to cruise-liners and postage-stamps to planes, throughout an exceptionally prolific career of six decades and counting.

FIFA World Cup 1994 Official Poster, 1994, poster print, 36 x 24”; Life Magazine Cover: Portrait of the Artist as a Very Rich Man, 1969, magazine print, 10.5 x 14”; Super Bowl XXIX Official Poster, 1995, poster print, 36 x 24”

Welcome to the world of Peter Max. Or, at least, the former world.

Instead, turning 87 this week under an alleged predatory conservatorship and large-scale art production scandal, the life of pop-art figurehead Peter Max is now just as surreal as much of his art once was. From attempted murder-by-brazil-nut (yes, seriously), to hired goons, imposing private detectives, kidnapping, embezzlement, and seemingly never-ending litigation, Max’s current existence shares more in common with a Scorsese thriller than the final years of a self-proclaimed ‘yogi’. All the while, Max’s work continues to demand (in many cases, irrationally) high prices, especially from the buoyant cruise-ship-auction market. However, the harsh consequence of Max’s debilitating Alzheimer’s and dementia is not only the purported exploitation of his wealth and person, but also the fall of his creative output, with the consensus that almost a decade has passed since Max had any personal involvement (beyond a bi-weekly signing session) in the churning out of new Peter Max ‘originals’ for sale. It is a strikingly tragic demise for a man whose vivid work once sought to “love all” and capture an effervescent generation’s unbridled joy and freedoms.

Having fled the holocaust after birth in Nazi Germany, Max’s early years were somewhat disturbed by relocation, moving with his family from Berlin to Shanghai, Israel, and Paris, before settling amongst the suburbs of Brooklyn during his teens. Max trained formally at the Louvre, Art Students League, and School of Visual Arts, initially developing an intensely-realist painterly style. However, it was not long before Max moved towards abstraction and the vibrant hues of a nouveau generation, settling on an artistic manner which he felt to be “very apropos for the 60s” and which would catapult him to celebrity before the turn of the decade. Soon, Max was gracing the Ed Sullivan Show, painting with Johnny Carson, and befriending The Beatles. For decades (sustained, rather ironically, by the never-ending growth of capitalism and its seductive brand-commissions) he enjoyed a significant fame and not inconsiderable fortune.

Then, suddenly in 2015, it stopped. Alzheimer’s having markedly damaged his true creativity, journalists and friends reported that Max was old, confused, and increasingly-weary. As his study took on a Warhol-esque production state, those around him began to see the dollar-signs. His home, which once entertained the nation’s great-and-good, is now locked, silent, and surveilled. Max is rarely seen in public, whilst many of his closest friends and family claim that his (legally-contested) conservatorship has denied them visits to the artist. Instead, in a decade thus far defined by cruise ship sales and court battles, the sadly dwindling and increasingly controversial life of Peter Max and those around him no longer exhibits the ‘hippie-aesthetic’, burgeoning freedoms, and vivid tones of Max’s work that once defined a generation and their legendary values.

Bibliography

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Weber, Carol Ruth. “Interview: Meet Peter Max.” Arts Management Magazine. March 24, 2021. https://www.artsmanagementmagazine.com/article/meet-peter-max/.