Art to the Max

Peter Max describes his hometown of Manhattan as a “very big playground for creativity.”

His private 35,000 square-foot studio, next to Lincoln Center, provides the artist many rooms where he creates his art using a variety of mediums. After six or seven hours of painting, Max can move to another room in his studio and work in ceramics, or another to work on his copper-plate etchings, or still another to work with television, video and the computer.

This weekend, the Wentworth Galleries in Newport and Laguna Beach launch their annual Peter Max retrospective, which will collectively feature 300 of his paintings.

The German-born artist believes being inspired by the world of art, exploring different mediums, doing what you like to do — and taking chances — is what each moment in life is about.

His work encompasses four decades of such moments. Americana, the environment, world peace, animal rights, music, sports and saving the planet are some of the subjects Max has tackled on canvases, posters, walls and stages throughout his career.

The artist has been invited to the White House, where he painted images of the Statue of Liberty. He’s done portraits of six presidents; a series of works called the “Better World Series,” inspired by his experience at the Live Aid concert; created the largest rock ’n’ roll stage ever built for the Moscow Music Peace Festival, and received a 7,000-pound section of the Berlin Wall from the German Chancellor in 1989.

He had the wall installed on the aircraft carrier Intrepid in New York City, where he got on a ladder and, with a chisel and hammer, “chipped a concave dove out of the top corner of the wall.”

Using the material he removed from the wall, Max mixed in more cement and formed a 3-D dove in flight, which he then placed back on the wall.

“My idea was that I took the dove from within the wall and gave it flight, freed it,” he said.

He also saved a cow.

As the story goes, when a certain bovine in Ohio escaped the slaughterhouse and was returned by authorities, he intervened.

“It took six days and six nights, but I fell in love with this little girl,” he said about the cow during a telephone interview. “And I didn’t even know what she looked like.”

On the cow’s behalf, Max donated work to benefit the local Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, to ensure she was taken care of for life at the New York Farm Sanctuary.

He still drives up there to see her, even though he knows she has no idea who he is.

“I’m just another guy walking by, but I’m grateful beyond belief that I was able to save her.”

The Max retrospective at Wentworth Galleries is a tremendous thrill for the artist.

“It’s the only time I get to see everything at once — 35 years of drawing and painting, and I’m so wowed,” he said.

Max marvels at some of the work he did when he was younger, during the Pop Art era; the work that established his fame.

So much of his imagery came from inside his head. Seeing it on canvas, he often asks himself today, “How did I have the nerve to do that?”

Chris Nilsen, the Wentworth Gallery director, said Max makes personal appearances at every one of their 20 galleries throughout the year.

Nilsen said it’s also unusual to see a collection of so many Max paintings in one location, and that while the artist’s colors have changed a little bit, no one seeing one of his paintings would ever doubt the artist was anyone other than Peter Max.

“It’s amazing how even after 35 years, Peter’s colors seem unique to him as an artist. You know immediately it’s Peter Max. You can even see his decades — the ’60s, ’70s,” Nilsen said.

“His message of live for today, get something special, get something you can enjoy,” was what people responded to, Nilsen said.

“It’s a big world,” the artist reported from the street outside his studio. “First, take care of yourself; then take care of others.”

IF YOU GO

WHAT: Peter Max Retrospective Art Exhibit

WHEN: 6 to 9 p.m. Friday

WHERE: Wentworth Gallery, 271 Newport Center Drive, Newport Beach

COST: Free

INFO: Max will be available to sign copies of his books at the gallery. For information, call (949) 760-9554 or go to www.petermax.com

SUE THOENSEN may be reached at (714) 966-4627 or at sue.thoensen@latimes.com.