Can I Buy A Bob Ross Painting
Bob Ross is not a difficult man to find.
Though he died in 1995, the tardily TV painter remains an omnipresent cultural staple. His Chia Pet perm, nap-inducing voice, and meme-worthy sayings — "Happy niggling copse!" — accept transcended time. On YouTube, old episodes of his evidence, The Joy of Painting, boast ~450m views.
Online, you lot can acquire Bob Ross paints, Bob Ross brushes, Bob Ross underwear, Bob Ross coffee mugs, Bob Ross energy drinks, Bob Ross watches, and Bob Ross toasters.
But at that place'due south one thing yous won't often meet for sale: his artwork.
During his lifetime, Ross produced tens of thousands of paintings. Yet, merely a handful of his works take popped up for sale in recent years. When they do appear, they oft fetch $10k+ and attract dozens of bids.
Why is the work of one of history'due south most prolific and accessible artists and then scarce on the open market?
To find out, I spoke with art gallery owners, auctioneers, fine art collectors, ex-colleagues who worked with Ross, and the president of Bob Ross, Inc. — the visitor that preserves his legacy.
The human behind the canvas
Born in Daytona, Florida, in 1942, Ross dropped out of school in 9th grade to work with his father, a carpenter.
At 18, he joined the Air Force and moved to Alaska, where he'd spend the adjacent 20 years as a drill sergeant, screaming at recruits. He was such a hard-ass that he earned the nickname "Bosom 'em upward Bobby."
But his life changed when he discovered art.
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Inspired by the Telly painter Bill Alexander, he started painting landscapes on golden mining pans and selling them at local markets in Alaska.
His income from painting soon surpassed what he made in the military. So, in 1981, he migrated dorsum to Florida, trained under Alexander, and became a certified painting teacher.
Bob Ross strikes a happy pose (Photo: Acey Harper/The LIFE Images Collection via Getty Images)
Now, here'due south where things took a wild plow for Ross:
- One of his students, Annette Kowalski, was "mesmerized" past the jolly painter and encouraged him to strike out on his own.
- They pooled together their life savings, launched Bob Ross, Inc., and fix out to brand Ross into a Telly star.
- A PBS executive gave them a shot.
- The prove — The Joy of Painting, which aired between 1983 and 1994 — was a huge striking and was circulate on ~300 stations to 80m+ people every twenty-four hour period.
In each 27-minute episode, Ross would paint one landscape from showtime to finish, shepherding viewers through his process with a soothing disposition, entertaining commentary, and an occasional guest advent by his pet squirrel, Peapod.
Ross didn't get paid for his shows. Only Bob Ross, Inc. — which he partially owned — used the platform to sell paints, 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 — i before, ane during, and one later on taping.
But his TV career only scratched the surface of his total output.
Pre-fame, in Alaska, he sold thousands of paintings. And even while famous, he painted nigh every solar day at seminars, events, and charity auctions in between tapings.
All told, Bob Ross churned out ~30k paintings in his lifetime — nearly 3x the output of Picasso, a prolific painter in his ain right.
Zachary Crockett / The Hustle (painting © Bob Ross Inc.)
For years, collectors and fans accept clamored to own their own slice of Bob Ross lore. Multiple fine art dealers told The Hustle that demand for his work is extraordinarily robust.
Only Ross paintings are a chip like diamonds: vast in book, deficient on the open up market.
Major auction houses — Christie's, Sotheby's, Phillips — have no Bob Ross sales history. Craigslist draws a naught. A scan of eBay simply turns upwards 3 sales in the final half dozen months, ii of which are of dubious origin.
Where the heck are those 30k paintings?
Bob Ross, Incorporated
As a part of Ross'southward understanding with Bob Ross, Inc., the paintings he created for TV were work for hire, pregnant the company maintained ownership of his work.
When Ross died in 1995, Bob Ross, Inc. (and thus, the paintings) became the sole property of Annette Kowalski and her husband, Walt.
Today, ane,165 Bob Ross originals — a trove worth millions of dollars — sit in cardboard boxes inside the company's nondescript office edifice in Herndon, Virginia.
Joan Kowalski, Annette's daughter, and the electric current president of Bob Ross, Inc., tells The Hustle that the company had never really given the paintings much thought.
"The paintings have always just sort of been here," she says, with a chuckle. "We were sort of behind the times… it never occurred to u.s.a. that anyone would want them."
The company, which can be reached by dialing i-800-BOB-ROSS, gets abiding inquiries from folks about buying the paintings.
But they're not for auction.
"Our only mission," Kowalski says, "is to preserve the mythological wonderment that was Bob Ross."
Summit: Joan Kowalski (summit left; president of Bob Ross, Inc.) and Sarah Strohl (executive banana) laugh at a social media post of a fan wearing Bob Ross socks; Lesser: Strohl sifts through some of the company's many original Bob Ross paintings (Bill O'Leary/Getty Images)
Function of the reason Bob Ross, Inc. isn't interested in selling the paintings is that information technology has far more lucrative assets on hand — like Bob Ross's IP.
The visitor holds 154 copyrights, and numerous trademarks on Ross's name and likeness, which they use to sell millions of dollars' worth of Bob Ross-themed trade and instructional courses.
On occasion, Bob Ross, Inc. leases out a few paintings to galleries and exhibits around the country:
- 54 paintings can exist seen at The Bob Ross Art Workshop & Gallery in New Smyrna, Florida.
- 27 paintings are at Minnetrista'south Bob Ross Experience in Muncie, Indiana.
- iv 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 near all the other paintings Ross gave away or sold during his life?
The open market
Jessica Jenkins, a VP at the Minnetrista exhibit, and a Bob Ross scholar, tells The Hustle that many more Ross paintings are actually hanging in living rooms across the United states of america.
"He was always happy to donate his paintings to fundraisers, or sell his work at a reasonable price," she says. "Many people who ain i acquired it decades ago."
For years, WIPB-TV — the PBS affiliate station in Muncie, Indiana, where Ross filmed most of his episodes — would auction off a Ross painting at its annual fundraising bulldoze.
According to the boondocks'south newspaper, The Star Press, these paintings were ever "the well-nigh anticipated detail," overshadowing tickets to Cancun, diamond necklaces, rare Beanie Babies, and basketballs signed past Magic Johnson.
"Nosotros even so have iv of his paintings hanging here at the station," says Lori Georgi, a director at WIPB. "People come up from England only to see them."
An old newspaper clipping advertises an auction for an original Bob Ross painting featuring "majestic snow-covered mountains, a tranquil lake surrounded past towering evergreens, and a beautiful sunset sky." (The Star Press; Muncie, Indiana, 2000)
Before he became a Idiot box star, Ross as well sold thousands of his landscape paintings at flea markets, fairs, and malls, often for minor sums of greenbacks.
This is how Larry Walton, 82, of Crosslake, Minnesota, acquired his original Bob Ross.
Back in 1980, while working as a flight teacher in Alaska, he bought a scene with mountains and blue northern lights from the then-unknown "peculiar artist" at an Anchorage off-white for $60.
It spent years sitting in the garage until his son — an avid fan of Bob Ross YouTube videos — thought the signature in the corner looked familiar.
When the couple decided to sell information technology, they turned to Modern Antiquity, an art gallery and dealer in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Ryan Nelson, the gallery's possessor, tells The Hustle that he's been buying and flipping Bob Ross paintings for 10 years. To discover sellers like Walton, he uses SEO tactics and places "wanted" ads in local newspapers virtually where Ross spent time.
"We purchase and sell more of his paintings than any gallery on the planet," he writes via email. "To retain that position, we offering more coin to buy his paintings than most anyone is willing to risk."
The Waltons sold the painting to the gallery for $10k; Nelson and then flipped it on eBay for a minor profit.
Unlike traditional fine art collectors, those who possess Bob Ross paintings tend to exist ordinary folks who don't know what they're in possession of.
"Most families that take these paintings are not millionaires," he says, "and the money is very impactful in their lives."
An original Bob Ross painting up for auction on Mod Artifact's website for $95k (Modern Artifact)
Modern Antiquity has sold at least 34 Bob Ross paintings over the years.
Nelson wouldn't divulge the auction prices, but said it's not uncommon for them to get well across $10k. On the site, he currently has a rare ocean scene listed for $94k.
It may seem odd that Bob Ross paintings fetch that much at market.
Later on all, Ross often produced a painting in less than 30 minutes (by contrast, information technology took da Vinci 4 years to complete the Mona Lisa), and his artwork was, by design, highly replicable.
Only 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 people want them than tin have them," he says. "They're also the ideal chat pieces, since they are almost universally recognizable."
A few Bob Ross classics. Acme: 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 art appraisal site Mearto, estimates that the off-white marketplace value of a Ross painting — the price it should sell for based on precedent — is $2k to $4k. But the popular culture chemical element to his piece of work boosts demand.
"I would personally categorize Ross's piece of work as a hybrid between fine fine art and entertainment memorabilia," she says.
Some buyers are willing to pay a premium for that.
I collector who didn't wish to be named out of business for her privacy, owns an extensive cache of artwork, including several vi-effigy pieces. Just she considers her Bob Ross original her "crown precious stone.""I've had more guests comment on my Bob than my Picasso," she tells The Hustle. "It'southward really all almost the story."
Information technology'southward all about the process
Ultimately, the real reason there aren't more Bob Ross paintings upward for sale is that the artist never wanted them to be a commodity.
For Ross, the value was in the process, non the finished product.
"He was about as uninterested in the actual paintings as you could peradventure be," says Kowalski. "For him, it was the journey — he wanted to teach people. The paintings were just a ways to exercise that."
Annotation : Top paradigm of Bob Ross © Bob Ross Inc.; photograph illustration 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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