Does anyone remember Peter Max?
Andrew Hansen 
I loved his art work growing up in the '70. My first job was in a department store where they sold his designer ladies hosiery. I bought a pair at Christmas claiming they were for my mother.
Offsite Link| by Anonymous | reply 52 | August 10, 2022 8:50 AM |
All I know about him is that Continental Airlines flew a 777 in the early 2000s painted in a special livery designed by him.
Offsite Link| by Anonymous | reply 1 | August 3, 2022 10:09 PM |
I have a book somewhere here…
Anyway, he autographed when I bought it.
| by Anonymous | reply 2 | August 3, 2022 10:10 PM |
I had a drink with him at a bar on Columbus Avenue in the 90's He was sitting alone at the bar and I was visiting NYC, waiting for my friend who was very late, so we chatted. I was 22 or so. I remember it because he was charming and interesting. He knew the barman quite well and was clearly more than a few drinks in. But it was particularly memorable because while we were chatting, he kept leaning away in the other direction even though no one was sat beside him.
When my friend arrived he said hello, and got up from the bar, told me how nice it was to chat, and as he walked off he equally quietly slipped me a white fabric napkin - with my portrait on it in black felt pen. Signed and dated.
It's framed in my mother's house to this day.
Lovely man.
| by Anonymous | reply 3 | August 3, 2022 10:18 PM |
Park West has the market on cruise ship sales. But, I have to admit ~ in that setting they are so attractive. I almost bought one, but decided to take a shore excursion, instead.
Offsite Link| by Anonymous | reply 4 | August 3, 2022 10:30 PM |
I remember Milton Glaser but I thought Seymour Schwast was the most talented.
| by Anonymous | reply 5 | August 3, 2022 10:38 PM |
I know Peter and what's happening to him now is tragic. He's got Alzheimer's and is in the middle of a horrible battle over his custody. The appointed guardian is basically draining off all his money and keeping his own family away from him. The guardian even got rid of his beloved cats. Libra, his daughter, is a terrific person but is in a state of shock over how difficult it is to undo the situation.
If something like this can happen to Peter, who was one of the most influential pop artists of the 20th century, it can happen to any of us.
Offsite Link| by Anonymous | reply 6 | August 3, 2022 10:50 PM |
There is a lot of information missing here. Why hasn't any of the family or friends applied to be a successor guardian? In my flyover, the probate courts give preference to family/friends as long as they are suitable.
I was once involved in a huge family estate dispute where they were fighting over a Peter Max painting. The appraisal came in much lower than the greedy child who was fighting for it wanted.
| by Anonymous | reply 7 | August 3, 2022 11:01 PM |
[quote] The appraisal came in much lower
They are now considered as relics from a bygone era.
The advertising industry relied on EXCELLENT artist/illustrators in the 80s.
But now everything is Photoshop and digital fake photography. The age of superb illustrators has passed.
| by Anonymous | reply 8 | August 3, 2022 11:13 PM |
I guess his style would be called 'psychedelic'.
Wiki says—
[quote] Max's repeated claims, varying in detail, to have worked on Yellow Submarine have been denied by the production team.
Offsite Link| by Anonymous | reply 9 | August 3, 2022 11:52 PM |
I once found a Peter Max silk scarf at Goodwill and sold it on Ebay for $50. It was garish.
| by Anonymous | reply 10 | August 3, 2022 11:54 PM |
They're still selling his artwork on cruise ships, but it dodgy. See the link.
Offsite Link| by Anonymous | reply 11 | August 4, 2022 12:05 AM |
I remember him from the Beatles cover art but that's it. I never liked his work.
| by Anonymous | reply 12 | August 4, 2022 12:08 AM |
[quote] I never liked his work.
Is it too garish? Is it unrefined?
| by Anonymous | reply 13 | August 4, 2022 12:10 AM |
Too garish, too cartoonish for me.
| by Anonymous | reply 14 | August 4, 2022 12:12 AM |
I loved his artwork in the 60s. Several years ago a local gallery was exhibiting/selling some of his recent work and he was there. They were also selling a book about his art. So I decided to stop by out of curiosity.
His current work was nothing like his bright, colorful 60s artwork… it was dark, kind of ugly. I didn’t meet him but I observed him signing books and talking to people and he seemed down to earth, personable. Sorry to hear what happened to him.
| by Anonymous | reply 15 | August 4, 2022 12:40 AM |
I have an old Tshirt that features his artwork for an event I attended in Berlin in 1990. It's one of only two old t-shirts I've hung onto. I love is work.
| by Anonymous | reply 16 | August 4, 2022 12:41 AM |
My sister and father both had signed pieces by him, from the 1980’s. When my dad passed away, we let my brother have the Peter Max, because it went better in his modern home. It was an original acrylic on canvas and probably worth quite a bit. It wouldn’t have worked in anyone else’s home. I’m thankful for siblings that aren’t greedy.
| by Anonymous | reply 17 | August 4, 2022 12:52 AM |
17 responses and nobody asked OP if he wore the hosiery??
| by Anonymous | reply 18 | August 4, 2022 1:47 AM |
he never did a Beatles album cover and he didn't work on Yellow submarine. He was my first artist crush as a preteen and I had a blowup plastic pillow with one of his designs on it - great use of color and line. He was involved with singer Rosie Vela who had an album produced by Steely Dan or they wrote songs on it.
| by Anonymous | reply 19 | August 4, 2022 1:54 AM |
He'd occasionally shop with Warhol at the Flea Markets. They were kind of frenemies. Warhol thought he was a sell-out and dissed him in the Diaries.
| by Anonymous | reply 20 | August 4, 2022 2:39 AM |
As a kid I loved him at the time too, OP. His work, or knockoffs of it, really visually defined the early 70s.
I’d buy a Peter Max before I’d buy a Patrick Nagel. M
| by Anonymous | reply 21 | August 4, 2022 2:50 AM |
I worked in a women’s clothing boutique on Columbus Avenue during the summer of 1987. One weekday a skinny older guy came in with a sexy yet wholesome blonde girl who appeared to be close to my age (18). She looked like a Michele Phillips sexy hippie girl-type, a real throwback look for 1987.
I was behind the register and he came up to me, handed me an American Express card, then said “she’s going to buy whatever she wants with this.”
He was very nice and cheerful and I figured she was his daughter and maybe she had had some trouble using his card in stores before.
Then they hot-kissed in front of me, whispered a few things to each other, and he left. Not his daughter.
She was very smiley and pleasant while she shopped, tried on things, and eventually came up to the register with about $700 in knitwear. I looked at his credit card: PETER MAX.
He should have married her and not the maniac he married in the 1990s.
| by Anonymous | reply 22 | August 4, 2022 3:16 AM |
I got a handful of these (there were two other designs) from the concession stand when we went to see Paint Your Wagon.
Offsite Link| by Anonymous | reply 23 | August 4, 2022 3:27 AM |
as a modern pop artist I would say he was what Keith Haring became two decades later. He was huge especially to the hippie generationl. I had a bold silk scarf and a plastic inflatable pillow of his.
| by Anonymous | reply 26 | August 4, 2022 4:34 PM |
My parents put up Peter Max wallpaper in my sister's room in the mid-70s that created a mural like image of a couple dancing against a landscape with a sunset. it looked a bit like the "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" sequence in "Yellow Submarine."
It was apparently a huge bitch to put up because you had to match the pieces of the wallpaper so exactly. We then moved to another house two years later.
| by Anonymous | reply 28 | August 4, 2022 5:01 PM |
^^^^ Did you take the wallpaper with you?
| by Anonymous | reply 29 | August 4, 2022 5:47 PM |
His look really was of a time and when you see his famous style it is analogous with the youth culture at that time.
That generally doesn’t age well. Just like He-Man figures, highly collectible today, will become relics, his art primary speaks to those of the era, or trying for a look inspired by.
I think the main difference between Warhol and Max is that while Warhol painted everyday things, Max put his paintings on everyday things. Dali was doing a lot of that at the time as well, and it was also seen as a money grab. Same with Picasso and his ceramics.
I remember Max being interviewed on TV back in the early Eighties pretty regularly and I always got the feeling he was a good guy.
| by Anonymous | reply 30 | August 4, 2022 6:07 PM |
I think his work was colorful yet bland. It does remind me of Keith Haring's popularity.
| by Anonymous | reply 31 | August 4, 2022 6:33 PM |
I had one Peter Max poster among the posters on my bedroom wall. Most of them were blacklight posters but the Peter Max poster was not fluorescent. It was still very colorful though.
Here is the connection between Peter Max and the Beatles:
Offsite Link| by Anonymous | reply 32 | August 5, 2022 5:18 AM |
Peter Max had one style and stuck to it.
Some of Seymour Chwast is similar to Max but he worked across a greater variety of illustrative styles.
Offsite Link| by Anonymous | reply 33 | August 5, 2022 5:23 AM |
This Indian owner of a Dallas Vegetarian restaurant told me back in the late 90's or early 2000's that Peter Max was a regular customer and wanted him to become his business partner in opening the same kind of restaurant in Austin. Indian owner did eventually open one in Austin but closed it after a year because he hated everything about Austin. Not sure if Peter Max was his partner or not, however, Peter Max did give him the idea.
| by Anonymous | reply 34 | August 5, 2022 5:44 AM |
It's funny, because Peter Max work looks so dated- while Warhol's still looks so fresh.
| by Anonymous | reply 35 | August 5, 2022 5:47 AM |
R35 I don't think one can generalise about Warhol's "work".
He was joker and satirist who got his staff to produce a whole range of stuff in a whole range of styles.
I couldn't imagine Mr Warhola working up a sweat to produce any of his 'work'.
| by Anonymous | reply 36 | August 6, 2022 12:54 AM |
R36, bullshit. Warhol is considered one of the greatest artists of the last 100 years. With sale prices to prove it.
You obviously know nothing about his life- or work.
| by Anonymous | reply 37 | August 6, 2022 12:59 AM |
Last year an insurance office was shutting down and they were selling everything in it cheap among plants and filing cabinets and I noticed on the wall was a cheaply framed signed edition of a Peter Max serigraphy called "Before My Talk" and asked what they wanted and got it for 3 bucks. On the back was the original price of $40 from a galley in Baltimore in 1972. It has since been reframed and hangs in the kitchen.
| by Anonymous | reply 39 | August 6, 2022 1:40 PM |
R26 Was it the watermelon pillow?
| by Anonymous | reply 40 | August 7, 2022 6:44 AM |
i work as a contractor in NYC and went to his apartment about five yrs ago fo a consultation. Riverside Drive in the 80s. I don't recall the details (did I know it was him when I got there, or did I figure it out later etc.), but it was his wife (I think) that met w me. He was upstairs the whole time and we never met. He's senile and suffers from dementia. The living room was a not-very -well maintained cross section of 60's era one-offs and furniture. I did not get the job.
But when I was in sixth grade my brother and I had the Peter Max bedsheet set! From The Akron.
| by Anonymous | reply 41 | August 10, 2022 12:20 AM |
Yes! I got Peter Max "stationery" when I was a little kid -- basically a notepad with stars and rainbows and other PeterMax-alia all over it, with the motifs repeated on lime, violet, aqua, acid-yellow, and other pages, with corresponding envelopes. I was both fascinated and kind of terrified, and it actually encouraged me to write notes to friends and relatives, because I knew how cool I'd seem.
| by Anonymous | reply 42 | August 10, 2022 12:24 AM |
Is he a "holocaust survivor" if his family fled Berlin with him in 1938? To Shanghai.
| by Anonymous | reply 43 | August 10, 2022 12:27 AM |
So any German Jew who immigrated before the Final Solution camps even existed is a Holocaust Survivor? I mean OK but it's news to me as a definition.
| by Anonymous | reply 45 | August 10, 2022 12:34 AM |
[quote] I mean OK but it's news to me.
Get with the programme! A man who thinks he is a woman IS a woman!
| by Anonymous | reply 46 | August 10, 2022 12:37 AM |
One time in 1988 my family went to stay with my dad's rich sister. One day while they were out, my mom and I went snooping around in her giant bedroom. She had a cute little Peter Max original if a woman's sillouette in the bathroom. I soon realized that my mom and I made foot prints all over the freshly vacuumed carpet and we could not find the fucking vaccum anywhere. So I grabbed a plastic coat hanger and kind raked over our steps. My mom was so impressed with my sneakiness and I was impressed by hers. We laughed for years about it
| by Anonymous | reply 47 | August 10, 2022 12:39 AM |
^ I don't understand. You made wet footprints in the carpet?
| by Anonymous | reply 48 | August 10, 2022 12:41 AM |
Didn't realize he served prison time for income tax evasion, his wife killed herself and they allegedly stole $4.6 million from a man with dementia and blew it on jewelry and other expensive things.
| by Anonymous | reply 49 | August 10, 2022 12:44 AM |
Let's connect some dots... DL favorite Dale Bozzio + Peter Max, in an early example of computer generated graphics used in a mainstream medium.
Offsite Link| by Anonymous | reply 50 | August 10, 2022 12:46 AM |
R48, she had super fluffy and freshly vacuumed carpet with symmetrical tracks on it. We defiled it with our regular footprints and then it was like the maid just took the vacuum with her as she backed out of the room. There was no vacuum anywhere in the fucking house
| by Anonymous | reply 51 | August 10, 2022 4:31 AM |
