6 ms·

I don't know why the article and everyone here is coming away with the conclusion that Bob Ross didn't want his art to be sold. A simpler reasoning is that the

by paxys 1y ago

I don't know why the article and everyone here is coming away with the conclusion that Bob Ross didn't want his art to be sold. A simpler reasoning is that there wasn't any demand for his paintings while he was alive. His show ran from 1983-1994 and he died in 1995. He was reasonably popular at that time, sure, but Bob Ross as we know him only blew up in the 2010s in the internet/YouTube/streaming age. Now there is a trove of 1,165 paintings which are no doubt valuable, but cannot all be sold because they would flood the market and decrease their own value. So Bob Ross, Inc. is cleverly keeping them under lock and key and letting the scarcity drive prices up.

earlyriser 1y ago
Yeah, this was what happened when Warhol died, the market was flood with thousands of works.
lurk2 1y ago
> He was reasonably popular at that time, sure, but Bob Ross as we know him only blew up in the 2010s in the internet/YouTube/streaming age. He remained popular after his death. I can remember seeing memes of Bob Ross as early as 2008.
- Modified3019 1y ago
  Going back further, from what I saw he had notoriety even back in 2003/2004 on 4chan.
  - deleted 1y ago
    [deleted]
  - Rendello 1y ago
    Peep Show was calling him "God" in 2003: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=74sDcT7Z3M0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=74sDcT7Z3M0
- derektank 1y ago
  Yeah, I grew up watching reruns of his show on PBS in the early 00's. It was much more fun to watch when home sick than Antiques Roadshow.
  - mcphage 1y ago
    What, The Price Is right not good enough for you?!
    - JKCalhoun 1y ago
      When the price of cars became more than four digits (and the first digit was not a "3") I bailed on "Price is Right". Too hard.
      - mcphage 1y ago
        lol, that’s fair :-)
- mcphage 1y ago
  Yeah. He’s being rediscovered, but at his death, he’d already spent 20 years being discovered in the first place.
tanewishly 1y ago
Bob Ross was known in my country (in Europe) due to his show at the time. Not quite universally, but probably closer to a household name than any other living painter was at the time. Dunno how it was in other countries in Europe, but still. The man was relatively well known for paintings, paintings that were regarded well by the general audience (experts: dunno). So while maybe he couldn't be selling his paintings for 1000s to the decently-off, there clearly was ample demand. If he truly wanted to make a boatload, he easily could have. Related: the treasure trove could easily be sold 1 painting at a time. Just don't make it regular - not once a year, but sometimes 2 in 2 months, and then 5 years nothing. That really wouldn't spurs the value that much, if at all.
Nashooo 1y ago
Genuinely curious to your age, as I'm suspecting some recency bias? As Bob Ross certainly was well known throughout Europe way before the 2010s.
- saalweachter 1y ago
  If you were growing up without cable in the US when he was on the air, PBS was one of like five channels you could watch.
- technothrasher 1y ago
  All us kids in the US knew him growing up in the 80’s, as he was on just before the cartoons on Saturday mornings.
khazhoux 1y ago
> He was reasonably popular at that time, sure, but Bob Ross as we know him only blew up in the 2010s in the internet/YouTube/streaming age. No, he was well-known already in early 90s (at least on my college campus), and his sayings were pre-internet memes. He was perfect match for slacker stoner culture
RobRivera 1y ago
> cannot all be sold because they would flood the market and decrease their own value. So Bob Ross, Inc. is cleverly keeping them under lock and key and letting the scarcity drive prices up. Personal pet-peeve. And yes, I know it doesn't really matter to most people. Still urks me. "CANT OR WONT!?"
- echelon 1y ago
  "I don't know, can you?" People that say that sometimes irk me with their pedantry. You don't hear it so much anymore, though, as all the people who once cared are elderly or gone. Language is mutable. I think the best thing you could do is let it go. Perhaps even ascribe a stronger meaning to this "incorrect" usage: it theoretically could be, but it won't be, because it can't be given the circumstances. Literally.
  - nothrabannosir 1y ago
    Sometimes people hide behind this detail in order to absolve themselves of responsibility, though. That’s not as benign as a mere shift in language. OP may have been pointing out responsibility rather than nitpicking language. “We cannot pay you more, or we won’t be able to hit the margins the market expects from us this year.” “We can’t license this sports event for wider audiences” “We can’t sell all of Bob Ross’s paintings or their value would go down”
- deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]
- makeitdouble 1y ago
  A way into this: it's not personal choices. Milking every dollar out of anything valuable is burned into people's souls, and willfully decreasing the value is not a possibility.
  - mandmandam 1y ago
    Try leaving America some time. I promise you, there are countries out there where that type of person is widely looked down on (usually the countries that had to fight off colonizers).
brandonmenc 1y ago
> Bob Ross as we know him only blew up in the 2010s in the internet/YouTube/streaming age. Uh, what? Bob Ross was very popular in the early 90s while he was still alive. So much so that he even did a promo for MTV. https://youtu.be/PuGaV-BvPlE https://youtu.be/PuGaV-BvPlE
fracus 1y ago
They are for sure selling them morsel by morsel and milking top value for as long as they can. Any other way and they are losing money.
codingdave 1y ago
> Bob Ross as we know him only blew up in the 2010s in the internet/YouTube/streaming age. No, he was just as well-known when his show was on the air. He was a household name, his paintings and style was known, and people talked about him enough to have opinions on whether he was an "artist" or just a TV show host.
- judge2020 1y ago
  I was going to call this anecdotal evidence based on it never appearing in the top 100 (or so) Nielson rated TV shows for a year, based on the lists for 1984-1995 here[0]. However, it looks like PBS never signed up for Nielson until 2009, so we have limited/no public data on viewership of The Joy of Painting (or Sesame Street, etc for that matter). http://www.thetvratingsguide.com/2020/02/tvrg-ratings-history-update-20.html http://www.thetvratingsguide.com/2020/02/tvrg-ratings-histor...
  - deleted 1y ago
    [deleted]
  - ysavir 1y ago
    There's a lot of TV shows out there, even in the 80s and 90s, and plenty of ways for celebrities to have their image and reputation bolstered. Ratings aren't reliable in trying to measure someone's notoriety. Growing up in the late 80s/90s, and mostly outside of the US, I can't remember a time when I didn't know who Bob Ross was.
    - mixmastamyk 1y ago
      Inside the US, never heard of him until later 2000s or so as well. And watched PBS at times.
      - fingerlocks 1y ago
        Did you grow up wealthy in the 80s? Most people didn’t have cable television back then, it was comparatively expensive and not available outside major metropolitan areas. Most people only had a half dozen TV channels or so, and sometimes Bob Ross was the only thing on TV worth watching. Everyone knew who he was.
majormajor 1y ago
I think a lot of the responses to this are ignoring the things that were popular in the 90s that don't see a big spike of demand more recently. Bob Ross was popular. Thomas Kinkade was popular. IMO it's doubtful Ross would've been as popular at retail in the 90s as Kinkade. One was a nice cute little educational show. One was "the painter of light" with a marketing engine around him. Both also had plenty of detractors from the "serious" art scene. Why did Ross get positive associations through 2000s internet culture that Kinkade never did? Which would you rather go buy now? Was it just nostalgia, since he was relevant much more to the lives of the kids that grew up to create a lot of the internet culture of the time? Probably a big chunk of it. But there's also just a certain right-place-right-time. Like, nobody seems to be going nuts about re-buying their childhood Pogs or even Beanie Babies. Ok, those were readily available at retail; Bob Ross wasn't. But Pokemon cards were too...
BennyH26 1y ago
Another explanation is that there is significantly more value in doing licensing deals: https://negosh.com/brand/54d96e91-3646-49bd-9226-532657431578/bob-ross https://negosh.com/brand/54d96e91-3646-49bd-9226-53265743157...
JohnFen 1y ago
The reason people think that Bob Ross didn't want the paintings he did for the show to be sold is because he said so. He considered them demos, not finished paintings, and you don't sell demos. He was also famous and popular before the internet discovered him. The internet certainly boosted his visibility, though.

by paxys 1y ago

earlyriser 1y ago

Yeah, this was what happened when Warhol died, the market was flood with thousands of works.

lurk2 1y ago

> He was reasonably popular at that time, sure, but Bob Ross as we know him only blew up in the 2010s in the internet/YouTube/streaming age. He remained popular after his death. I can remember seeing memes of Bob Ross as early as 2008.

Modified3019 1y ago
Going back further, from what I saw he had notoriety even back in 2003/2004 on 4chan.
- deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]
- Rendello 1y ago
  Peep Show was calling him "God" in 2003: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=74sDcT7Z3M0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=74sDcT7Z3M0
derektank 1y ago
Yeah, I grew up watching reruns of his show on PBS in the early 00's. It was much more fun to watch when home sick than Antiques Roadshow.
- mcphage 1y ago
  What, The Price Is right not good enough for you?!
  - JKCalhoun 1y ago
    When the price of cars became more than four digits (and the first digit was not a "3") I bailed on "Price is Right". Too hard.
    - mcphage 1y ago
      lol, that’s fair :-)
mcphage 1y ago
Yeah. He’s being rediscovered, but at his death, he’d already spent 20 years being discovered in the first place.

tanewishly 1y ago

Bob Ross was known in my country (in Europe) due to his show at the time. Not quite universally, but probably closer to a household name than any other living painter was at the time. Dunno how it was in other countries in Europe, but still. The man was relatively well known for paintings, paintings that were regarded well by the general audience (experts: dunno). So while maybe he couldn't be selling his paintings for 1000s to the decently-off, there clearly was ample demand. If he truly wanted to make a boatload, he easily could have. Related: the treasure trove could easily be sold 1 painting at a time. Just don't make it regular - not once a year, but sometimes 2 in 2 months, and then 5 years nothing. That really wouldn't spurs the value that much, if at all.

Nashooo 1y ago

Genuinely curious to your age, as I'm suspecting some recency bias? As Bob Ross certainly was well known throughout Europe way before the 2010s.

saalweachter 1y ago
If you were growing up without cable in the US when he was on the air, PBS was one of like five channels you could watch.
technothrasher 1y ago
All us kids in the US knew him growing up in the 80’s, as he was on just before the cartoons on Saturday mornings.

khazhoux 1y ago

> He was reasonably popular at that time, sure, but Bob Ross as we know him only blew up in the 2010s in the internet/YouTube/streaming age. No, he was well-known already in early 90s (at least on my college campus), and his sayings were pre-internet memes. He was perfect match for slacker stoner culture

RobRivera 1y ago

> cannot all be sold because they would flood the market and decrease their own value. So Bob Ross, Inc. is cleverly keeping them under lock and key and letting the scarcity drive prices up. Personal pet-peeve. And yes, I know it doesn't really matter to most people. Still urks me. "CANT OR WONT!?"

echelon 1y ago
"I don't know, can you?" People that say that sometimes irk me with their pedantry. You don't hear it so much anymore, though, as all the people who once cared are elderly or gone. Language is mutable. I think the best thing you could do is let it go. Perhaps even ascribe a stronger meaning to this "incorrect" usage: it theoretically could be, but it won't be, because it can't be given the circumstances. Literally.
- nothrabannosir 1y ago
  Sometimes people hide behind this detail in order to absolve themselves of responsibility, though. That’s not as benign as a mere shift in language. OP may have been pointing out responsibility rather than nitpicking language. “We cannot pay you more, or we won’t be able to hit the margins the market expects from us this year.” “We can’t license this sports event for wider audiences” “We can’t sell all of Bob Ross’s paintings or their value would go down”
deleted 1y ago
[deleted]
makeitdouble 1y ago
A way into this: it's not personal choices. Milking every dollar out of anything valuable is burned into people's souls, and willfully decreasing the value is not a possibility.
- mandmandam 1y ago
  Try leaving America some time. I promise you, there are countries out there where that type of person is widely looked down on (usually the countries that had to fight off colonizers).

brandonmenc 1y ago

> Bob Ross as we know him only blew up in the 2010s in the internet/YouTube/streaming age. Uh, what? Bob Ross was very popular in the early 90s while he was still alive. So much so that he even did a promo for MTV. https://youtu.be/PuGaV-BvPlE https://youtu.be/PuGaV-BvPlE

fracus 1y ago

They are for sure selling them morsel by morsel and milking top value for as long as they can. Any other way and they are losing money.

codingdave 1y ago

> Bob Ross as we know him only blew up in the 2010s in the internet/YouTube/streaming age. No, he was just as well-known when his show was on the air. He was a household name, his paintings and style was known, and people talked about him enough to have opinions on whether he was an "artist" or just a TV show host.

judge2020 1y ago
I was going to call this anecdotal evidence based on it never appearing in the top 100 (or so) Nielson rated TV shows for a year, based on the lists for 1984-1995 here[0]. However, it looks like PBS never signed up for Nielson until 2009, so we have limited/no public data on viewership of The Joy of Painting (or Sesame Street, etc for that matter). http://www.thetvratingsguide.com/2020/02/tvrg-ratings-history-update-20.html http://www.thetvratingsguide.com/2020/02/tvrg-ratings-histor...
- deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]
- ysavir 1y ago
  There's a lot of TV shows out there, even in the 80s and 90s, and plenty of ways for celebrities to have their image and reputation bolstered. Ratings aren't reliable in trying to measure someone's notoriety. Growing up in the late 80s/90s, and mostly outside of the US, I can't remember a time when I didn't know who Bob Ross was.
  - mixmastamyk 1y ago
    Inside the US, never heard of him until later 2000s or so as well. And watched PBS at times.
    - fingerlocks 1y ago
      Did you grow up wealthy in the 80s? Most people didn’t have cable television back then, it was comparatively expensive and not available outside major metropolitan areas. Most people only had a half dozen TV channels or so, and sometimes Bob Ross was the only thing on TV worth watching. Everyone knew who he was.

majormajor 1y ago

I think a lot of the responses to this are ignoring the things that were popular in the 90s that don't see a big spike of demand more recently. Bob Ross was popular. Thomas Kinkade was popular. IMO it's doubtful Ross would've been as popular at retail in the 90s as Kinkade. One was a nice cute little educational show. One was "the painter of light" with a marketing engine around him. Both also had plenty of detractors from the "serious" art scene. Why did Ross get positive associations through 2000s internet culture that Kinkade never did? Which would you rather go buy now? Was it just nostalgia, since he was relevant much more to the lives of the kids that grew up to create a lot of the internet culture of the time? Probably a big chunk of it. But there's also just a certain right-place-right-time. Like, nobody seems to be going nuts about re-buying their childhood Pogs or even Beanie Babies. Ok, those were readily available at retail; Bob Ross wasn't. But Pokemon cards were too...

BennyH26 1y ago

Another explanation is that there is significantly more value in doing licensing deals: https://negosh.com/brand/54d96e91-3646-49bd-9226-532657431578/bob-ross https://negosh.com/brand/54d96e91-3646-49bd-9226-53265743157...

JohnFen 1y ago

The reason people think that Bob Ross didn't want the paintings he did for the show to be sold is because he said so. He considered them demos, not finished paintings, and you don't sell demos. He was also famous and popular before the internet discovered him. The internet certainly boosted his visibility, though.