Bob Ross, the beloved painter who headlined the PBS series The Joy of Painting for 11 years and nearly 400 episodes, left behind an astounding 1,143 paintings after his death in 1995. Now, nearly 25 years later, the late painter's collection of "happy little" paintings have been found, but they probably won't ever land in art dealer's possession.
Ross, who painted three of the same painting per episode on the PBS series, left his massive collection of oil landscapes under the care of his longtime business partner and painting collaborator, Annette Kowalski, and her daughter Joan. The paintings are stored at the Bob Ross Inc. headquarters in Virginia, the New York Times reports.
While some of Ross' paintings have been donated to the Smithsonian to be part of a permanent exhibit at the National Museum of American History, Kowalski told the Times she has no intention of selling any of her late partner's paintings because that "wasn't really Bob's thing."
"It actually has never really occurred to us. We've never really talked about it."
