Artschool dropout here. People have mixed feelings. On one hand, he taught a lot of people how to paint and (more importantly) not be afraid of paint. On the other, he didn't challenge himself and was doing the same thing over and over, creating a lot of kitsch and commercial art.

As far as I know, he never had any long-term projects or stuff done in private. This means he plateau'd and stayed at the same skill level his entire career. Compare that to people we consider masters, like Picasso or Rembrandt or Michaelangelo. They were constantly looking for new ways to challenge themselves and trying to unlearn everything they knew to create something new. We have a lot of discoveries because of it.

Picasso invented collage and expanded our knowledge of 2D design. Rembrandt created the building blocks for Impressionism and Expressionism, while uplifting printmaking into its own artistic medium. Michaelangelo went out and practically invented new colors. Bob Ross, by comparison, didn't do much other than show how to paint something quickly. And speed is something all artists get better at with practice.

Furthermore, some of my professors resented Ross for reinforcing realism as the only way of creating art, especially among normies. Ross didn't do this intentionally. It was just a side effect of making landscapes easy. Keep in mind, we're still in the Post-Modern era and a lot of my instructors were the Post-Modern rebels who suffered under their Modernist mentors. So for them, it's frustrating trying to move art forward and have people still cling to what was already done 75 years ago. Even more so when they know the Modernists before them did put a lot of labor into their work.

Using Picasso again as an example, he'd start by drawing something realistically. Then he'd draw it again, but with less detail. And again. And again. And again. He'd get an object down to having as little detail as possible while still being recognizable as what it was supposed to represent. Then he'd compose these drawing into a painting. For Guernica, his magnum opus, he spent an entire summer doing this. There's thousands of drawings for this one, single painting he did and it's a huge painting (like 10 feet by 15 or some shit).

Now imagine you're an art professor who knows this and some asshole wearing a Bob Ross shirt walks into your class and says "Picasso paints like shit."

(I was told not to wear my Bob Ross shirt again)

I'm pro-Bob Ross because I think he helped demystify art for a lot of regular people who might have never gotten into it otherwise.

IMO one of the biggest problems with creative stuff in general is that people have this horrible idea that there are the talented and the untalented, and if you aren't born special, you don't get to do it and can't ever be good at it.

In my view, having a popular mainstream figure break painting down as a learnable skill sort of helped bring it back to regular people.

I may be missing a joke, but Bob Ross does this by using a lot of shortcuts and brush stroke techniques. I think he's respected but I don't think most artists feel at all outclassed. I paint too and while I love the idea of him showing that anyone can paint, I wouldn't really want my landscapes to look like his do.

No hate towards him at all but it's just a different way of painting that kindof maximizes time to output efficiency. But I enjoy painting, and I'm good with a painting taking 20 hours.

His painting style is very simplistic. He used large brushes and a limited amount of color to make it easier and quicker. The point of his show was to make it easy for the non-artistic person to paint.

as others here stated, Bob Ross just did a specific type of painting well but didn't pioneer anything: except

he is the father of ASMR. he may not have known it, but the arrangement of microphones and the use of the soft brushes, along with his cadence and personality, all laid the foundations

most people tuned into his show to relax and feel good. as a kid, my grandmother would watch because she painted landscapes but i just liked my hairs standing on end and the squishy feeling from the scratch scratch, watching a task be completed, and hearing someone softly talking positive stuff to me

and i know people will argue against this but ASMR, despite plenty not "getting it", is a legitimate modern artform

Bob Ross is the perfect Sunday painter.

No real hate from me though, I don't think he had many pretentions about being Avant garde or whatever, he just liked making his simple, pretty, little paintings and that was enough. However if someone was interested in learning about art, I would recommend Ross last even when it comes to landscape painting.

A side note, but Ross has a very underexamined view of landscape as a subject. These are postcards, but not much else. They do not engage with the history or problematics of landscape/painting, something which many art critics have written about even from a Marxist standpoint. It is art without history, which is not very interesting in the long run.

Bob would practice each painting 3-4 times before each show. He was crazy fast and achieved that level of speed by rehearsing a few times before filming. Also, his style very often was a bit repetitive, so I'm sure that helped - just sort of mixing and matching familiar elements. Even with rehearsing and the paintings being similar, though, he was crazy fast and consistent.

the style he's painting in is partially designed for speed. according to wikipedia he took the style and the show idea from Bill Alexander's The Magic of Oil Painting

Pretty sure every episode required 3 completed paintings. He painted one off camera to use as reference, and then would paint two copies during the filming of the show. Guy loved to paint.

i'm pissed off he never painted any smut. what the hell bob?

No I don’t think he was gaslighting everyone…I don’t know too much about his personal life so if he like murdered someone then let me know lol but otherwise he seems like he genuinely wanted to bring calmness and good vibes to people’s lives. Like if many people wanted to paint but just thought they couldn’t, I think he was saying hey once you get the hang of this (particular efficient way of painting), it’s not so hard and anyone can do it. Seems like a really inclusive dude. I loved watching him a few years ago

I've legit actually followed along on a couple paintings after getting some basic kit oil. I would have to pause a lot, but following the technique actually helped me get some nice results. I know it's kitsch, but that's not the point. He enjoyed what he did and he wanted other people to be able to get in to it, enjoy it, and connect with other's using art. I had always gotten the impression that he saw himself as a stepping stone to people pursuing artistic expression overall. He was also the original ASMR. As far as his technique, he honed it while in the Air Force and stationed in Alaska (painting what he saw around him of course), and further polished it when he got out and did art full time. If you do stuff like this day in and day out for years, you'll get fast too. He also did a lot of shortcuts as others have said. Personally, I think he was great for the simplicity and accessibility. I've taken what I learned painting with oil and been able to use similar/modified techniques to do some really cool stuff with acrylic, finishing wood, painting houses, pottery painting, arranging composition, color mixing, and even photography. I pay attention to details and it honestly has helped make any of my artistic pursuits more enjoyable.

This thread, summarized:

"No hate to Bob Ross, but dude was a fucking hack"

he served the us military for more than a decade.

Not everyone can paint, actually. That's the problem with him.

(it me, I can't paint)