NEW YORK — Psychedelic pop artist Peter Max has died at 88, his son Adam Max said in a written statement Wednesday, Sept. 16, 2026, the Associated Press reported.

Max died Monday, Sept. 14, the family statement said. No cause was given. His swirly, vividly colored “flower power” imagery of the 1960s — posters, product lines, later stamps, a Norwegian Cruise Line ship, a Boeing 777, and portraits from U.S. presidents to Taylor Swift — made him one of the era’s most commercially recognizable artists, AP wrote.

“We will remember his extraordinary creativity, his warmth, his curiosity, and the way he saw beauty and possibility everywhere,” Adam Max said. “His art became part of American culture, but the man behind that art — the father we knew and loved — is the person we will miss most.”

Born Peter Max Finkelstein in Berlin in 1937, Max’s Jewish family fled Nazi Germany for Shanghai when he was a baby, later lived in Tibet, Israel, and Paris, and settled in New York when he was 16. He studied at the Art Students League, School of Visual Arts, and Pratt Institute, opened a graphic-design studio in 1961, and became a late-1960s commercial phenomenon — Life magazine cover subject in 1969 — before briefly shutting the product machine to return to painting. He was later the official artist for events including the Olympics, Super Bowl, and World Cup.

AP also noted darker chapters: a 1997 tax-fraud guilty plea, and mid-2010s family/guardianship litigation that described him as frail. Museum of Modern Art holds seven of his works. He is survived by his second wife, Mary Max; son Adam Cosmo; and daughter Libra Astro, AP reported. (Some secondary outlets have separately described advanced dementia; the family statement released Wednesday did not state a cause.)

Dated Wednesday, Sept. 16, 2026 (death Monday, Sept. 14): Adam Max announces Peter Max dead at 88; no cause in family statement; AP obituary on flower-power career, stamps/cruise ship, Adam Max quote.

Sources