Bob Ross (October 29, 1942 in Daytona Beach, Florida – July 4, 1995) was an American painter and television presenter. He 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 was the host of The Joy of Painting, perhaps the most recognized, 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 2" brush in paint thinner, he'd "beat the devil out of it." 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 introduced the wet-on-wet painting technique which is the application of wet paint on top of wet paint, omitting the traditional waiting period for each layer to dry. Combining this method with the use of large 1-inch and 2-inch brushes allowed Ross to paint trees, water, clouds and mountains in a matter of seconds. In his method of painting there are no mistakes, only "happy accidents" which can be integrated into any painting.

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, and snow scenes and cabins which were often mentioned as favorites of Ross. Having learned to paint on his own, he is notable for having no formal artistic training (e.g., art school).

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

The series was taped for 11 years, until 1993 and is broadcast in many countries worldwide. Currently (2004/2005) The Joy of Painting is being shown on Turkish state broadcaster TRT (with the title Resim Sevinci), German television (BR-Alpha), Discovery Real Time (Sky Digital channel 133) in the UK, and AT5 in Amsterdam, among 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.

Ross's style of quick, methodic paintings 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 uses a limited range of overly-simplistic techniques, and that many of his landscapes lack a basic grounding in the natural world. Supporters of Ross point out that he has helped many people discover the excitement of painting, and that this should be taken into account when considering Ross's body of work and influence.

--Wikipedia