Robert Norman Ross (October 29, 1942 – July 4, 1995) was an American painter and art instructor who created and hosted the The Joy of Painting, an instructional television program that aired from 1983 to 1994 on PBS in the United States, CBC
in Canada, and similar channels in Latin America, Europe and elsewhere.
Ross would subsequently become widely known through his posthumous
internet presence.
Ross was born in Daytona Beach, Florida, to Jack and Ollie Ross, a carpenter and a waitress respectively, and raised in Orlando, Florida. As an adolescent, Ross cared for injured animals, including armadillos, snakes, alligators and squirrels, one of which was later featured in several episodes of his television show. He had a half-brother Jim, whom he mentioned in passing on his show. Ross dropped out of high school in the 9th grade. While working as a carpenter with his father, he lost part of his left index finger, which did not affect his ability to later hold a palette while painting.
In 1961, 18-year-old Ross enlisted in the United States Air Force and was put into service as a medical records technician. He rose to the rank of master sergeant and served as the first sergeant of the clinic at Eielson Air Force Base in Alaska,
where he first saw the snow and mountains that later appear as
recurring themes in his paintings. He developed his quick painting
technique during brief daily work breaks.
Having held military positions that required him to act tough and mean,
"the guy who makes you scrub the latrine, the guy who makes you make
your bed, the guy who screams at you for being late to work", Ross
decided he would not raise his voice when he left the military.
During his 20-year Air Force career, Ross developed an interest in painting after attending an art class at the Anchorage U.S.O. club. He found himself frequently at odds with many of his painting instructors, who were more interested in abstract painting. Ross said, "They'd tell you what makes a tree, but they wouldn't tell you how to paint a tree."
Ross was working as a part-time bartender when he discovered a TV show called The Magic of Oil Painting, hosted by German painter Bill Alexander. Alexander used a 16th-century painting style called alla prima
(Italian for 'first attempt'), widely known as "wet-on-wet", that
allowed him to create a painting within thirty minutes. Ross studied and
mastered the technique, began painting and then successfully selling Alaskan landscapes that he would paint on novelty gold-mining pans Eventually, Ross's income from sales surpassed his military salary. He retired from the Air Force in 1981 as a master sergeant.
He returned to Florida, studied painting with Alexander, joined
his "Alexander Magic Art Supplies Company" and became a traveling
salesman and tutor. Annette Kowalski, who had attended one of his
sessions in Clearwater, Florida,
convinced Ross he could succeed on his own. Ross, his wife, Kowalski
and Walt, her husband, pooled their savings to create his company, which
struggled at first.
Ross was noted for his permed hair, which he ultimately disliked but kept after he had integrated it into the company logo.
In 1982, a station in Falls Church, Virginia, aired a taping of his art class as a pilot, and 60 PBS stations signed up for the show in the first year. In 1983, PBS station WIPB lured him to Muncie, Indiana,
with the promise of creative freedom, and he found a kinship with the
staff. He moved home to Florida in 1989 but continued to travel to
Muncie every three months to tape the show. Ross said he did the show
for free and made his income from how-to books, videotapes and art
supplies.
The show ran from January 11, 1983, to May 17, 1994, but reruns still continue to appear in many broadcast areas and countries, including the non-commercial digital subchannel network Create and the streaming service Hulu. In the United Kingdom, the BBC re-ran episodes during the COVID-19 pandemic while most viewers were in lockdown at home.
During each half-hour segment, Ross would instruct viewers in the quick, wet-on-wet oil painting
technique, painting a scene without sketching it first, but creating
the image directly from his imagination, in real time. He explained his
limited paint palette, deconstructing the process into simple steps.
Artist and art critic Mira Schor compared Ross to Fred Rogers, host of Mister Rogers' Neighborhood, noting that Ross's soft voice and the slow pace of his speech were similar.
With help from the Kowalskis, Ross used his television show to
promote a line of art supplies and class recordings, building what would
become a $15-million business – Bob Ross Inc. – which would ultimately
expand to include classes taught by other artists trained in his
methods. Following Ross's death, ownership of the company was passed to the Kowalskis.
Ross also filmed wildlife, squirrels in particular, usually in
his garden, and he would often take in injured or abandoned squirrels
and other animals. Small animals often appeared on his Joy of Painting canvases.
Ross painted an estimated 30,000 paintings during his lifetime.[18]
Despite the unusually high supply of original paintings, Bob Ross
original paintings are scarce on the art market, with sale prices of the
paintings averaging in the thousands of dollars and frequently topping
$10,000. The major auction houses have never sold any of Ross's
paintings, and Bob Ross Inc. continues to own many of the ones he
painted for The Joy of Painting, as Ross himself was opposed to having his work turned into financial instruments. "A Walk in the Woods", Ross's first television painting, was sold in a pledge drive
offering shortly after the first season aired; it is, as of September
2023, in the hands of Ryan Nelson, a Minnesota-based art dealer who
acquired it from its original buyer and has been the primary dealer for
the few Ross paintings that have reached the open art market. Nelson has
placed an asking price of $9,850,000 for the sale of the painting and
has indicated he has other plans for the painting if it does not sell
for that price.
In contrast to more traditionally famous artists, Ross's work,
described by an art appraisal service as a cross between "fine art" and
"entertainment memorabilia" — is most highly sought after by common fans
of The Joy of Painting, as opposed to wealthy collectors. The
artwork circulating among collectors is largely from Ross's work from
before he launched the television show.
A cigarette smoker for most of his adult life, Ross expected to die
young and had several health problems over the course of his life. He died at the age of 52 on July 4, 1995, in Orlando, Florida, due to complications from lymphoma.
His remains are interred at Woodlawn Memorial Park in Gotha, Florida, under a plaque marked "Bob Ross; Television Artist".
Ross kept his diagnosis a secret from the general public. His lymphoma
was not known outside of his circle of family and friends until after
his death.
Under the terms of the incorporation of Bob Ross Inc., the death
of any partner in the company would lead to that person's stock being
equally divided among the partners. Ross's death, along with that of his
second wife, the other partner in the company, left the Kowalskis with
sole ownership of the company. The Kowalskis were largely only
interested in using Ross's name for painting supplies. They became very
aggressive against Ross's family members and associates, allegedly
trying to pressure an ailing Ross to sign over rights to his estate
before his death.
Instead, Ross wrote the Kowalskis out of his will and testament,
leaving his estate and rights to his name and likeness to his son Steve
and half-brother Jimmie Cox. The Kowalskis countered that virtually
everything Ross had done in his lifetime was a work for hire and thus Ross had no right to bequeath them. The Kowalskis eventually won the lawsuit.
After the Kowalskis retired and Joan Kowalski took over the company, she became more open to merchandising
the Ross brand outside of its core business of painting products,
setting in motion the mass marketing of his name from the 2010s onward.
Joan also engineered a settlement with Steve Ross and Jimmie Cox
granting Bob Ross Inc. rights to Ross's name and likeness, in exchange
for a guarantee that Steve Ross could resume his art career without
threat of lawsuit, something that Steve Ross said had largely stopped
him from painting in public after his father's death.
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