Bob Ross Don't Paint People

[Grand Inquisitor]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zOpF_ZGD4Ps

Maybe this is old cow for most of you, but I got a kick out of it.  Evidently my grandmother was a huge fan in his hey day.

[The Atog Lord]

Wow, that was cool.

[Methuselahn]

No, no it wasn't.  Somehow, that video actually surpasses the level of suck that Bob Ross's paintings actually held the record for.

[LotusHead]

"Break out your paint knives, and little brush.
Lets move boost some mountains with some trees and a big ol' bush.
Creation can be so good, and take you away from all that's evil, evil, evil.
That's why I don't paint people."

I was actually stunned by this video.
Bravo!
One of the most original and touching things I've seen.

[Bram]

No, no it wasn't.  Somehow, that video actually surpasses the level of suck that Bob Ross's paintings actually held the record for.

Don't be hatin' on my man Bob, yo.

I love how every person I've ever met who criticized Bob Ross' paintings, couldn't even complete a paint-by-numbers picture if their life depended on it (which, at the time, it did).

[Methuselahn]

Their life depended on it??

Don't be hatin' on my man Bob, yo.

It surprises me that someone from Dutchieland would have such taste, given the history of great masters that have come from there.  Maybe they don't teach art appreciation there anymore??

[Bram]

Well, you have to take into account the facts that...

a. Rembrandt c.s. took, on average, a month to finish a painting (and had most of the actual work done by students) whereas Bob does a rather fetching landscape in under 15 minutes while dishing out important life lessons.
b. while Ross' style is obviously "routine painting" (as in: the stuff he does is always a somewhat random amalgam of clever tricks that make it look good, while not being difficult), I find the results relatively attractive, in a low-brow, this-looks-good-on-retirement-home-walls kinda way.
c. he's such an endearing guy.
d. HE'S A WHITE BOY WITH A 'FRO, DAWG!

Besides, IMO, you can't teach art appreciation. You can teach art history, art techniques etc. etc. but you either appreciate it or you don't (which is another way of saying I'm not really into the whole high art / low art thing. We live in a postmodern world, man!)

[Hi-Val]

Jan van Eyck, Hugo van der Goes, Antonello de Messina, Dürer, Raphael, Moroni, Bronzino, Holbein, Caravaggio, Hals, Velázquez, Van Dyck, and Chardin all used mirrors or lenses to make the painting easier. We shouldn't be falling back on the old masters, especially Dutch masters, as people who wouldn't cheat to make a painting they're getting paid to do go faster.

A lot of people rag on Bob Ross because they want painting to seem like something mystical that normal people cannot do. Insult his subject matter all you want, but Bob Ross showed people that it doesn't take fancy equipment or epic talent to make something beautiful with one's hands. He brought a lot of people into painting that would have never thought themselves capable of doing art beforehand. That is unequivocally a good thing.

While his stuff is a bit schmaltzy, it's not Thomas Kincaid schmaltz, and his humility makes him a good example for other people even if you don't like the paintings.

[Bram]

Hear hear!

But I can't help but wonder why, exactly, Bob Ross doesn't paint people.

[Klep]

Hear hear!

But I can't help but wonder why, exactly, Bob Ross doesn't paint people.

Because to paint a happy little bush on a person would make the painting grossly inappropriate for broadcast television.

[Bram]

OMG lol! Such vivid imagery

[Methuselahn]

A lot of people rag on Bob Ross because they want painting to seem like something mystical that normal people cannot do. Insult his subject matter all you want, but Bob Ross showed people that it doesn't take fancy equipment or epic talent to make something beautiful with one's hands. He brought a lot of people into painting that would have never thought themselves capable of doing art beforehand. That is unequivocally a good thing.

While his stuff is a bit schmaltzy, it's not Thomas Kincaid schmaltz, and his humility makes him a good example for other people even if you don't like the paintings.

Interesting.  None of the artists that I've worked with have ever expressed the desire for painting to be mystical or beyond what 'normal people' can do.   Just like with anything, painting merely takes practice.  You have to learn how see.   Further, being able to appreciate art is a matter of practice and pattern recognition for knowing what is good or bad.  This requires studying high art.  "Something beautiful" is taking a few liberties, imo.

Maybe it's because all of the instructors that I've learned from have detested folk art and Bob Ross is the king of that hill.  Maybe that's why *I* think he sucks.  He is humble, and likely was a fantastic guy, but the old masters never made a name for themselves because of humility, so I'm not sure how that applies.

found @ wikipedia:

In an episode of The Joy of Painting, Ross explained his preference for painting landscapes over portraits or people:

"Any way you paint a tree, chances are, somewhere there's a tree that looks like that. Years ago, I tried painting portraits, and I had a hard time. Number one, I couldn't capture the essence of what makes a person an individual. The other thing was, if you paint a landscape, and it doesn't come out just right, somebody else will come along and say, 'Hey, I've seen that place, maybe I used to fish and play there.' If you paint a portrait that has one eye square or something, I guarantee everybody's going to notice it. So I gave up portrait painting. My portrait teacher told me to go paint bushes and trees, because that's where my heart was."

Ross was a Timmy.

So,  who out there is going to buy the Bob Ross upcoming video game?   

That all said, the man did have a fro that stands the test of time.

[Hi-Val]

It would seem that detesting folk art and kitsch is a great example of wanting art to be mystical. It's being elite about subject matter. I mean, someone else used the same paints, brushes, canvas and techniques that you did, and if they made folksy flea market art, then clearly you have to make your art seem more important and serious than theirs so you don't get grouped with them. It's an ego thing.

The artist's personality leeches into paintings, at least for me. I see Picasso drinking the souls of young women in his paintings and I cannot stand Dali, largely due to his support of Franco.

[Methuselahn]

Personally, I don't see how subject matter has anything to do with folk art.  Folk art is artwork created by people with no training.  It's self evident that people are individuals and have their own varying degrees of training and skill.  Saying that it is an ego thing doesn't make sense to me.  Worrying about being grouped with other people sounds like an artist's personal problem.

The last thing I want is for paintings/artwork to be mystical.  It would make me very happy if everyone was able to look at a piece and tell me why it works or doesn't work, why the composition, texture, line, color, value, etc. is bad or good.  This would be a great benefit to working artists. 90+% of the time you hear  "I like it."  Not helpful.

Bob Ross was an untrained folk artist that had his own television program.  Way to get a professional, PBS.

[Bram]

Hah! Now we get to the core of it. It is, then, an exclusion mechanism, based on whether or not an artist had recieved formal training. This is fully understandable, since carving out a niche or attempting to obtain a "mandate" from society to exclusively engage in some activity or another (say, art) is a well-documented and important in cultural sociology.

It even applies to scientists. One could argue if "scientific" knowledge is indeed somehow strictly better than "folk" knowledge, as it has been thought to be over the past couple hundred years or so (read James C. Scott's "Seeing like a state" on the distinction between, respectively, "techne" and "metis" knowledge). It is increasingly believed that we're headed towards a "mode II" society, where such knowledge types are not seen hierarchically, but complementary. Perhaps the argument could go along the same lines for the production art.

Wait - wasn't this the humor forum?

[Klep]

Wait - wasn't this the humor forum?

Yeah, we decided to go meta with the humor forum by ironically promoting philosophical discussion on it.  It's funny because it's not funny!

[Methuselahn]

Hah! Now we get to the core of it. It is, then, an exclusion mechanism, based on whether or not an artist had recieved formal training. This is fully understandable, since carving out a niche or attempting to obtain a "mandate" from society to exclusively engage in some activity or another (say, art) is a well-documented and important in cultural sociology.

Hell yeah it's an exclusion mechanism.  The caveat here is that he had his own television show and was teaching bad technique.  Just as I wouldn't want my retarrded monkey's uncle to teach quantum theory at the local university, I don't want Bob Ross to teach bad art technique to the casual viewer.  I will go so far as to say that Bob Ross sucks partly because he's taken society two steps back when it comes to appreciating art.

It even applies to scientists. One could argue if "scientific" knowledge is indeed somehow strictly better than "folk" knowledge, as it has been thought to be over the past couple hundred years or so (read James C. Scott's "Seeing like a state" on the distinction between, respectively, "techne" and "metis" knowledge). It is increasingly believed that we're headed towards a "mode II" society, where such knowledge types are not seen hierarchically, but complementary. Perhaps the argument could go along the same lines for the production art.

That book analyzes the failures of various urban planning, utopian schemes, and social planning.   I don't see how you could use his epistemic vs practical knowledge argument in the same context here.   


Oh.  And I thought the Vintage Improvement forum is where the humor subjects go.     This IS a rather lame Humor discussion.  I wouldn't disagree there.  I haven't thought about Bob Ross this much in the last fifteen years.

[Bram]

That book analyzes the failures of various urban planning, utopian schemes, and social planning.

 

Yes, and in a very compelling way, too. I wasn't really referring to the main "pointe" of the book, though.

I don't see how you could use his epistemic vs practical knowledge argument in the same context here.   

Well, they're obviously not comparable one-on-one. But folk art does seem to have a highly contextual feel to it, relying on practical wisdom and abilities drawn from experience. From somewhere:

"Metis is often non-verbal knowledge acquired through trail and error and it resists abstraction in the shape of rules and principles."

This is exactly what the type of art teaching you're talking about it not. From the same source:

"Techne is organized analytically into small, explicit, logical steps and is both decomposable and verifiable, characterized by impersonal, often quantitative precision"

I've seen art historians etc. deconstruct paintings in more or less exactly this way.

I haven't thought about Bob Ross this much in the last fifteen years.

Well then my work here is done