Bob Ross started my artistic journey
- Apr 5
- 2 min read
I started painting after watching Bob Ross produce one of his standards on TV in 2021. it was a rerun of many but it got my creative juices running. I had just retired and it was time to rekindle that passion to have a hobby I could use to both challenge myself and create something I had not dome for many years, a painting. Bob worked quite extensively in oil and so I set about procuring the necessary tools, paints, solvents, liquin etc. Much to my wifes chagrin my first attempts were in the winter months, I had not converted my home office into the art studio it is today, so I set up in the Garden Room. Not a good idea and which caused a first accident, more carelessness on my part with splashes of black oil paint on the floor and furniture. I was immediately banned to the office to freeze.
Several other attempts followed like "Winter Lake' shown across as I started to improve my skills a la Bob Ross.
At this point however I was starting to doubt my decision to start with oil as my chosen medium. The art studio, now known as MOO (Mark's Old Office) was starting to suffer from solvent spills, a growing number of filled 5L containers of waste solvent and no where to dispose of them. Oil had to go it was time to move on to acrylic. But then disaster struck. I got my first commission from one of my golfing mates, Danny. " Can you do me a painting of BB King ?" he announced in the 19th hole. Oh can you do me Muddy Waters, said Graham and now I was in serious trouble. I hadn't planned for this and didnt think I was anything like good enough...
How do you create portraits from a small picture to something that will hang on a wall? Grabbing for `Google I started reading and trying to find a suitable image that I could scale up using the grid approach. My journey had begun, sooner than I thought. Fifty books later, thank goodness for world of books I now have quite an extensive library at relatively low cost which I use as a valuable reference source regularly.
BB King and Muddy Waters were my last two oil paintings. Thankfully I have stopped polluting the planet and MOO.
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