RENOWNED ARTIST PETER MAX UNVEILS NEW PORTRAIT OF TAYLOR SWIFT
SWIFT PORTRAITS BY MAX AVAILABLE
TO PUBLIC FOR THE FIRST TIME
NASHVILLE, TN / NEW YORK, NY -- December 9, 2010 – World-renowned pop artist Peter Max has painted a new portrait of Taylor Swift to commemorate her newest album, Speak Now, which was certified Triple-Platinum by the RIAA this week. And next week, Max’s iconic portraiture of 4-time Grammy winner Swift will be available to the public for the first time.
The Speak Now portrait is Max’s second time to immortalize Taylor’s album art -- he unveiled a series of four portraits of her Fearless album earlier this year in a series of gallery showings. Max has gifted his first Fearless original work to Taylor, but now the Max portraits, from both Fearless and Speak Now, are available as poster artwork and as commissioned originals. Starting Sunday (December 12th) Max’s Taylor Swift works will be sold exclusively on www.TaylorSwift.com.
The Max / Swift relationship began when Max painted a portrait of Taylor’s Fearless album cover upon learning that Taylor was launching her 2010 Fearless tour in Tampa the same week that he had a gallery showing there. “I've been doing portraits of iconic musicians for so many years, and it is a pleasure to add Taylor Swift to the collection,” says Max. “She is one of the most beautiful and talented stars we have today.”
Taylor was thrilled when she learned of Max’s interest in doing the portrait, as she is a lifelong fan of his, having often seen his work on display in the Ocean Gallery in Stone Harbor, New Jersey. Swift remembered walking past the gallery window many times as a child and young teen, and was often stopped in her tracks by the vibrancy of Max’s works.
Max’s Fearless portraits have been featured in several gallery exhibitions, but were not available for sale. His Speak Now portrait has not been shown prior to today.
With paintings on exhibition in hundreds of museums and galleries worldwide, Peter Max and his vibrant colors have become part of the fabric of contemporary culture. Max has been successively called a Pop Icon, Neo Fauvist, Abstract Expressionist and the United States’ "Painter Laureate."
Max has a long-standing career as the preeminent Pop artist in America, and is the country’s most well known and most collected artist. He has achieved his place in history having painted for various Heads of State. Often incorporating iconic symbols of America into his work, Max has painted for six U.S. presidents, created the official artwork and poster for the Clinton Inauguration, his "Flag With Heart" impressionistic paintings of the American flag are in permanent installations in the Carter, Reagan and Bush presidential libraries in addition to his statue of Liberty paintings, which have become an annual painting tradition since America's Bicentennial, in 1976 and led to Max playing a lead role in the renovation of the Statue of Liberty. From art that appeared on the first U.S. 10-cent stamp bearing the title “Preserve the Environment,” to 235 U.S. Border murals greeting millions of people entering America each year, Peter Max seeks to capture themes of America at its finest in his art.
Taylor Swift is a four-time GRAMMY winner, the top-selling digital artist in music history, has had singles top both the Country and Pop radio charts, and had the #1 best-selling album in any genre of music in 2009. With 1,046,718 copies sold in the US in the first week of release, her Speak Now album scored SoundScan’s biggest single-week sales total since 2005 and is the biggest debuting country studio album in history. With the release of Speak Now, Taylor made history on the Billboard Hot 100, charting a record-breaking 11 songs from one album in a single week. Taylor, who writes all of her own songs, has career record sales now in excess of 17 million albums and 31 million song downloads.
This year, at the age of 20, she became the youngest artist in history to win the music industry’s highest honor, the GRAMMY Award for Album of the Year. Also at the 2010 GRAMMYs, she took home the awards for Country Album of the Year, Best Country Song, and Best Country Female Vocal Performance. Her 6x-Platinum FEARLESS album is the most awarded album in Country music history.
In 2009, she was named Artist of the Year at the American Music Awards, and also became the youngest artist in the 43-year history of the Country Music Association to be awarded country music’s top prize when she took home the CMA Award for Entertainer of the Year. Taylor currently holds the Billboard all-genre records for most first-week downloads by a female artist, for the longest charting album of this century and for most Top 20 debuts in a calendar year, as well as the Billboard record for the largest overall airplay audience for a country-based act.
Taylor plans to tour in support of SPEAK NOW, and is currently slated to play 90 shows in 19 countries in 2011.
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