Bob Ross paintings raise $1.27M for public television after Trump cuts

Three paintings by Bob Ross sold at a Jan. 27 auction in Massachusetts generated $1.27 million, Bonhams Skinner said, with net proceeds to benefit public television following funding cuts under the Trump administration. Bonhams Skinner said Change of Seasons, painted live on a 1990 episode of The Joy of Painting, sold for $787,900 — 13 times its high estimate.

Babbling Brook (1993) fetched $279,900, six times its estimate, and Valley View (1990) sold for $203,700, more than four times its high estimate. The three works were sold on behalf of American Public Television, which will pledge 100% of the net proceeds to support U.S. public television stations, Bonhams Skinner said.

A November auction in Los Angeles of Winter’s Peace, Home in the Valley and Cliffside raised $662,000; the net proceeds from that offering will also fund public television. “I'm deeply humbled by today's extraordinary results,” Joan Kowalski, president of Bob Ross Inc., said in a statement.

The auction funds are intended to help offset individual station licensing fees so viewers can continue to watch classic educational programming including America’s Test Kitchen, Julia Child’s French Chef Classics and Ross’ The Best of the Joy of Painting. Ross’s Joy of Painting was a PBS staple from 1983 to 1994; he died July 4, 1995 at age 52.

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