Arin Didnt Get Into Art School Because of Bob Ross
Bob Ross is not a hard man to discover.
Though he died in 1995, the late TV painter remains an omnipresent cultural staple. His Chia Pet perm, nap-inducing phonation, and meme-worthy sayings — "Happy picayune copse!" — have transcended fourth dimension. On YouTube, onetime episodes of his show, The Joy of Painting, boast ~450m views.
Online, you can acquire Bob Ross paints, Bob Ross brushes, Bob Ross underwear, Bob Ross java mugs, Bob Ross energy drinks, Bob Ross watches, and Bob Ross toasters.
But there's one matter you won't often see for auction: his artwork.
During his lifetime, Ross produced tens of thousands of paintings. Nonetheless, only a scattering of his works have popped upwards for auction in recent years. When they do appear, they often fetch $10k+ and attract dozens of bids.
Why is the work of ane of history's virtually prolific and accessible artists so scarce on the open market?
To find out, I spoke with art gallery owners, auctioneers, art collectors, ex-colleagues who worked with Ross, and the president of Bob Ross, Inc. — the company that preserves his legacy.
The homo backside the canvas
Built-in in Daytona, Florida, in 1942, Ross dropped out of school in ninth grade to piece of work with his father, a carpenter.
At xviii, he joined the Air Strength and moved to Alaska, where he'd spend the next twenty years as a drill sergeant, screaming at recruits. He was such a hard-ass that he earned the nickname "Bosom 'em up Bobby."
Only his life inverse when he discovered art.
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Inspired by the Goggle box painter Beak Alexander, he started painting landscapes on gilded mining pans and selling them at local markets in Alaska.
His income from painting presently surpassed what he fabricated in the war machine. So, in 1981, he migrated dorsum to Florida, trained nether Alexander, and became a certified painting instructor.
Bob Ross strikes a happy pose (Photo: Acey Harper/The LIFE Images Collection via Getty Images)
Now, here's where things took a wild turn for Ross:
- One of his students, Annette Kowalski, was "mesmerized" by the jolly painter and encouraged him to strike out on his own.
- They pooled together their life savings, launched Bob Ross, Inc., and ready out to make Ross into a Television star.
- A PBS executive gave them a shot.
- The bear witness — The Joy of Painting, which aired betwixt 1983 and 1994 — was a huge hitting and was broadcast on ~300 stations to 80m+ people every day.
In each 27-minute episode, Ross would pigment i landscape from start to stop, shepherding viewers through his process with a soothing disposition, entertaining commentary, and an occasional guest appearance by his pet squirrel, Peapod.
Ross didn't get paid for his shows. But Bob Ross, Inc. — which he partially owned — used the platform to sell paints, fine art supplies, workshops, instructional videos, and merchandise. By 1991, it was a $15m/year ($29m today) enterprise.
The actual paintings, though, were largely an afterthought.
Over the course of his career, Ross filmed 381 episodes of The Joy of Painting. For each episode, he painted 3 versions of the same artwork — ane before, 1 during, and 1 after taping.
Simply his TV career merely scratched the surface of his total output.
Pre-fame, in Alaska, he sold thousands of paintings. And even while famous, he painted nigh every day at seminars, events, and charity auctions in between tapings.
All told, Bob Ross churned out ~30k paintings in his lifetime — well-nigh 3x the output of Picasso, a prolific painter in his own correct.
Zachary Crockett / The Hustle (painting © Bob Ross Inc.)
For years, collectors and fans take clamored to own their ain slice of Bob Ross lore. Multiple art dealers told The Hustle that need for his work is extraordinarily robust.
But Ross paintings are a bit like diamonds: vast in volume, scarce on the open marketplace.
Major auction houses — Christie'south, Sotheby's, Phillips — have no Bob Ross sales history. Craigslist draws a goose egg. A scan of eBay merely turns up 3 sales in the final 6 months, two of which are of dubious origin.
Where the heck are those 30k paintings?
Bob Ross, Incorporated
Equally a part of Ross's agreement with Bob Ross, Inc., the paintings he created for TV were work for hire, pregnant the company maintained buying of his work.
When Ross died in 1995, Bob Ross, Inc. (and thus, the paintings) became the sole property of Annette Kowalski and her hubby, Walt.
Today, 1,165 Bob Ross originals — a trove worth millions of dollars — sit down in cardboard boxes inside the company's nondescript office edifice in Herndon, Virginia.
Joan Kowalski, Annette's daughter, and the current president of Bob Ross, Inc., tells The Hustle that the visitor had never really given the paintings much idea.
"The paintings have always just sort of been here," she says, with a chuckle. "Nosotros were sort of backside the times… it never occurred to u.s. that anyone would want them."
The company, which tin can exist reached by dialing 1-800-BOB-ROSS, gets constant inquiries from folks about buying the paintings.
Simply they're not for auction.
"Our only mission," Kowalski says, "is to preserve the mythological wonderment that was Bob Ross."
Top: Joan Kowalski (top left; president of Bob Ross, Inc.) and Sarah Strohl (executive assistant) express joy at a social media post of a fan wearing Bob Ross socks; BOTTOM: Strohl sifts through some of the visitor'south many original Bob Ross paintings (Bill O'Leary/Getty Images)
Part of the reason Bob Ross, Inc. isn't interested in selling the paintings is that it has far more lucrative assets on paw — like Bob Ross's IP.
The company holds 154 copyrights, and numerous trademarks on Ross'due south name and likeness, which they use to sell millions of dollars' worth of Bob Ross-themed merchandise and instructional courses.
On occasion, Bob Ross, Inc. leases out a few paintings to galleries and exhibits around the country:
- 54 paintings tin be seen at The Bob Ross Art Workshop & Gallery in New Smyrna, Florida.
- 27 paintings are at Minnetrista's Bob Ross Feel in Muncie, Indiana.
- 4 paintings are in the possession of the Smithsonian National Museum of American History in Washington, DC.
But this only answers a part of the mystery. What about all the other paintings Ross gave away or sold during his life?
The open up marketplace
Jessica Jenkins, a VP at the Minnetrista showroom, and a Bob Ross scholar, tells The Hustle that many more Ross paintings are really hanging in living rooms across the Us.
"He was always happy to donate his paintings to fundraisers, or sell his work at a reasonable price," she says. "Many people who ain one caused it decades ago."
For years, WIPB-Telly — the PBS affiliate station in Muncie, Indiana, where Ross filmed near of his episodes — would auction off a Ross painting at its almanac fundraising drive.
According to the town's paper, The Star Press, these paintings were always "the nigh predictable item," overshadowing tickets to Cancun, diamond necklaces, rare Beanie Babies, and basketballs signed past Magic Johnson.
"We still take 4 of his paintings hanging here at the station," says Lori Georgi, a director at WIPB. "People come from England only to see them."
An erstwhile newspaper clipping advertises an sale for an original Bob Ross painting featuring "regal snow-covered mountains, a tranquil lake surrounded past towering evergreens, and a cute sunset sky." (The Star Press; Muncie, Indiana, 2000)
Before he became a TV star, Ross also sold thousands of his landscape paintings at flea markets, fairs, and malls, ofttimes for small-scale sums of greenbacks.
This is how Larry Walton, 82, of Crosslake, Minnesota, acquired his original Bob Ross.
Back in 1980, while working as a flying instructor in Alaska, he bought a scene with mountains and blueish northern lights from the then-unknown "peculiar artist" at an Anchorage fair for $sixty.
It spent years sitting in the garage until his son — an gorging fan of Bob Ross YouTube videos — thought the signature in the corner looked familiar.
When the couple decided to sell it, they turned to Mod Artifact, an fine art gallery and dealer in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Ryan Nelson, the gallery'due south owner, tells The Hustle that he's been buying and flipping Bob Ross paintings for 10 years. To observe sellers like Walton, he uses SEO tactics and places "wanted" ads in local newspapers nearly where Ross spent fourth dimension.
"We buy and sell more of his paintings than whatever gallery on the planet," he writes via electronic mail. "To retain that position, we offering more coin to purchase his paintings than well-nigh anyone is willing to risk."
The Waltons sold the painting to the gallery for $10k; Nelson then flipped it on eBay for a small profit.
Unlike traditional art collectors, those who possess Bob Ross paintings tend to be ordinary folks who don't know what they're in possession of.
"Most families that have these paintings are not millionaires," he says, "and the money is very impactful in their lives."
An original Bob Ross painting upwards for sale on Modern Artifact'south website for $95k (Modern Artifact)
Mod Artifact has sold at least 34 Bob Ross paintings over the years.
Nelson wouldn't divulge the sale prices, merely said it'due south not uncommon for them to go well across $10k. On the site, he currently has a rare sea scene listed for $94k.
It may seem odd that Bob Ross paintings fetch that much at market.
Subsequently all, Ross often produced a painting in less than xxx minutes (past dissimilarity, information technology took da Vinci 4 years to complete the Mona Lisa), and his artwork was, past pattern, highly replicable.
But Nelson chalks the crazy prices up to a combination of basic economic principles and social capital.
"The bottom line is supply and demand: Bob Ross paintings are extremely tough to find, and more than people want them than tin can take them," he says. "They're also the ideal chat pieces, since they are almost universally recognizable."
A few Bob Ross classics. Superlative: Wilderness Way, The Joy of Painting, S31, E13.; BOTTOM: Northern Lights,The Joy of Painting, S8, E13. (both © Bob Ross Inc.)
Lindsey Bourret, managing managing director of the fine art appraisement site Mearto, estimates that the off-white market place value of a Ross painting — the price it should sell for based on precedent — is $2k to $4k. Just the popular culture element to his work boosts demand.
"I would personally categorize Ross'due south piece of work as a hybrid betwixt art and entertainment memorabilia," she says.
Some buyers are willing to pay a premium for that.
One collector who didn't wish to be named out of business organisation for her privacy, owns an all-encompassing enshroud of artwork, including several half-dozen-figure pieces. But she considers her Bob Ross original her "crown gem.""I've had more guests comment on my Bob than my Picasso," she tells The Hustle. "Information technology'southward actually all virtually the story."
It'due south all about the process
Ultimately, the real reason there aren't more Bob Ross paintings up for sale is that the artist never wanted them to be a commodity.
For Ross, the value was in the process, not the finished production.
"He was about as uninterested in the bodily paintings as you could possibly be," says Kowalski. "For him, it was the journey — he wanted to teach people. The paintings were merely a means to do that."
NOTE : Top image of Bob Ross © Bob Ross Inc.; photo analogy by The Hustle
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Source: https://thehustle.co/why-its-nearly-impossible-to-buy-an-original-bob-ross-painting/
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