Bob Ross

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This article is about the painter and television presenter. For the publisher/activist, see Bob Ross (publisher).
Bob Ross

Bob Ross (October 29, 1942 – July 4, 1995) was an American painter and television presenter. He was born in Daytona Beach, Florida, and spent a 20-year career with the U.S. Air Force in medical records, stationed mostly in Alaska, before his painting career and television program made him famous worldwide. He died in 1995 of lymphoma. He had a son, Steve Ross, who occasionally appeared on the show and filled in for his father. He claimed during a later season that Steve "painted the best mountains in the industry."

Television show

He was the host of The Joy of Painting, perhaps the most recognized and most watched art program in the history of U.S. television.

With a bushy afro and a calm, soothing voice, Bob Ross taught viewers to paint "happy little trees," "happy little clouds," and "pretty little mountains." On occasion, after cleaning his two-inch brush in paint thinner, he would "beat the devil out of it" and laughingly remark on his enjoyment of that process -- i.e., knocking the paint thinner off the brush by rapping it against the easel. He believed that everyone has inherent artistic talent and, given half an hour, anyone could paint a landscape by following his instructions and words of encouragement, including his popular phrase "we don't make mistakes, we just have happy accidents." The TV series also provided Bob Ross a platform to introduce his own and other people's little rescued "rascals" including squirrels, owls, and robins.

He utilized the wet-on-wet oil painting technique, which is the application of wet paint on top of wet paint, as opposed to the more traditional waiting period for each layer to dry. Combining this method with the use of large one-inch and two-inch brushes allowed Ross to paint trees, water, clouds and mountains in a matter of seconds. On the show he often credits Bill Alexander for teaching him this method.

Ross took up painting while stationed in Alaska in the Air Force. The geography of Alaska is visible in much of his later work on The Joy of Painting: mountains, lakes, snow scenes and cabins were favorite subjects. Although it is commonly believed that Ross had no formal artistic training, he said during one episode that, "as a pup," he attended art school.

He later expanded his show into a multimillion-dollar business that included "how-to" books, a line of brushes and paints, and classes in which instructors were trained in the Bob Ross method.

The series was taped for eleven years, up until 1993, and is broadcast in many countries worldwide. As of 2005, The Joy of Painting was being shown on Turkish state broadcaster TRT (with the title Resim Sevinci), German television (BR-Alpha), Discovery Real Time (Sky Digital channel 250) in the UK and AT5 in Amsterdam, as well as several other public stations across The Netherlands. The show also runs in syndication on American public television stations and on Create, a digital public broadcasting network. In Mexico, it is shown on the network of the IPN, Instituto Politécnico Nacional.

Video game

In March 2006, Bob Ross Inc. announced plans to license rights to develop a Bob Ross video game. AGFRAG Entertainment Group will receive the license and is planning on developing the game for PC, the Nintendo DS, and Nintendo's next-generation video game console, the Wii. The Wii was chosen because its Wii Remote is unique in its ability to sense 3D control, allowing the player to use the remote like a paintbrush, aptly suited to The Joy of Painting.

At first, the announcement was believed to be an early April Fool's Day joke. However, it was confirmed by several websites including IGN.com, the official Bob Ross website and the AGFRAG homepage.

Criticism

Ross' style of quick, methodic painting has received some criticism from other artists and art critics, who have called his style artificial and devoid of detail. They point to the fact that he used a limited range of overly-simplistic techniques and assert that many of his landscapes lacked a basic grounding in the natural world.

Supporters of Ross point out that he has helped many people discover the excitement of painting, as well as providing a form of spiritual therapy helping many who suffer from depression, and that this should be taken into account when considering Ross' body of work and influence.

Trivia

  • Ross has been featured on a T-shirt available at many clothing and retail stores.
  • Ross stated that his favorite part of painting is cleaning the brush.
  • Ross appeared in a promo for MTV in which he worked on a painting that turned out to be the MTV logo and declared "MTV. It's all fluffy white clouds."
  • Ross grew up in Florida and did not wear shoes to school until the sixth grade.
  • There is an urban legend that Bob Ross committed suicide. This is not true; he died from lymphoma in 1995.

Spoofs and parodies

Television

  • Ross was spoofed on the Fox television show Family Guy. In the opening of the second season episode "Fifteen Minutes of Shame," he paints a bush and tells the viewer, "We're just gonna put a happy little bush down in this corner, and that'll just be our little secret. But if you tell anybody that bush is there, I will come to your house and I will cut you!"
  • On the short-lived cult series Mission Hill Andy French tried to guess what Bob Ross was going to paint next. When Bob hesitated, Andy yells "A Happy little tree!" at the screen, gets it right and kisses the screen, proclaiming "I love you man!"
  • On the Dilbert television series, Dilbert, Ratbert, and Dogbert watch an obvious Ross parody called Painting with Rusty Shanks. Rusty shows them how to paint a taupe octagon, which (according to Rusty) was represented by an orange dot. He also says, "Last week I showed you how to use your own head as a brush." He is killed by Leonardo da Vinci's henchmen, apparently for not paying dues.
  • On the Dana Carvey Show, Ross is portrayed by cast member Robert Smigel painting a double portrait of the Menendez brothers embedded into a frosty mountain typical of Ross's style while saying, "They're going away for a long time; give 'em a tree."
  • Ross was spoofed in the Canadian TV show Buzz in the segment "Cable Access Painter."
  • The Seattle Television show Almost Live spoofed Ross in a holiday skit. Comparing the shades of colors he is using, he remarked that they reminded him of "big, fat Uncle Ed" choking on a turkey.
  • In the "Riley Wuz Here" (originally "Joy of Graffiti" after Ross's show) episode of The Boondocks, Ross appears as the crazy art teacher that Riley is forced to take lessons from after he is caught vandalizing a neighbor's house.
  • On the UK Channel 4 series "Peep Show" Ross was referred to as "God" as Jeremy watched his show and asked "Blimey, what's God up to now?"
  • The comedy program Hard Core TV (which aired in the United States on HBO in the early 1990s) included a spoof called The Joy of Tattooing. It featured a Ross-like character tattooing people with colors like Suffocation Blue and Gang Green.
  • The May 22, 2006 episode of Attack of the Show included a trailer for a nonexistent movie called The Bob Ross Code (a spoof of The DaVinci Code). It discusses how Bob Ross left clues in his painting concerning "Happy Little Twees." [1]
  • Nickelodeon's Doug once fantasized about being a painter resembling Bob Ross.
  • Mexican comedian Eugenio Derbez has a character called Bob Atroz (atroz meaning "atrocious"). His sketches consist of Bob teaching how to paint and saying things about the "happy trees" and "happy clouds" while cursing, all in a soothing voice. In these sketches, Derbez speaks English and viewers hear a "translation" in Spanish that isn't totally accurate and tones down some of the things Bob said.
  • In Road Trip, a motel clerk (Andy Dick) watches The Joy of Painting behind the reception desk, and attempts to imitate Ross using a ballpoint pen and a pad of paper.

Songs

  • Gym Class Heroes have a song titled "To Bob Ross With Love" on The Papercut Chronicles, in which they thank Ross for "all the happy little trees."
  • The German band Blumfeld mentions Ross in their song "Strobohobo." The lyrics say "Oblomov is painting with Bob Ross."
  • The Brooklyn, New York band Sacred Monkeys of Bali had a song titled "Bob Ross." It can still be heard on the Internet.

Other

  • Dana Carvey spoofed Ross in his movie Master of Disguise, appearing briefly painting the evil henchmen chasing him while murmuring, "Oooo... Isn't that refreshing?"
  • The Brothers Chaps pay homage to Ross on their popular Homestar Runner website. On the "toons" page, passing the mouse cursor over a video tape on the shelf shows the character Marzipan in full Ross gear. This is documented in the Homestar Runner Wiki.
  • One of Gary Larson's "Far Side" cartoons depicts a tree that has fallen through a house onto a woman who was obviously painting a landscape while watching Ross's show. Ross is saying: "And always make your trees look like happy trees."

References and notes

Wikiquote has quotations related to Bob Ross.
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