Two original Bob Ross paintings go up for auction Sept. 15 at Caza Sikes, a family-owned fine art auction house on Madison Road in Oakley.

The paintings, both created in 1987 at a Dayton art supply store, are authenticated by Bob Ross Inc. and carry opening bids of $24,000 each. Caza Sikes estimates each could sell for $50,000 to $75,000, according to WVXU.

Will Sikes, a partner at the auction house, told WVXU the paintings are exceptionally scarce at auction.

"When you do a search in our auction database, there's only 30 or so paintings of his that have ever sold at auction, and the reason for that is most of them are either held by PBS or by the Bob Ross foundation," Sikes said.

The auction house is a partnership of brothers Evan, Will and Graydon Sikes and their father, Reid Sikes, operating from 3078 Madison Road.

Ross painted both works during a promotional visit to a Dayton art supply store that sold his branded paints and brushes. Sikes told WVXU that Ross toured stores like it, doing live demonstrations for customers. The paintings came with photographs of Ross at the store, painting both pieces for the proprietor.

The current owner bought the paintings on Craigslist roughly 10 years ago from a relative of the store's original owner, according to Sikes. Caza Sikes traced the provenance and had both works authenticated.

One painting, "Mountain Landscape," depicts a snowy peak, a stream, a hunting cabin and what Sikes described as "a nice lemon-lit sky above the mountains." The inscription on the back reads: "To Jan, Best wishes to a special friend. Happy Painting. Bob Ross, 1987."

The second, "Wooded Landscape with Stream," shows a forested scene at dusk with a half-frozen stream. Its inscription reads: "To Jan, A very special friend. Happy Painting. Bob Ross."

Ross filmed more than 400 episodes of "The Joy of Painting" from 1982 to 1994 and created more than a thousand paintings, according to WVXU. He died in 1995 at age 52. Bob Ross Inc. estimates it holds a little over 1,100 of those works at its offices in Herndon, Va.

Recent sales show how steeply prices have climbed. In November 2025, three paintings sold at Bonhams in Los Angeles for a combined $662,000, with "Winter's Peace" fetching $318,000, The Art Newspaper reported.

Later that month, "Cabin at Sunset" sold for more than $1 million in an online charity auction organized by TV host John Oliver. In January 2026, three more sold at Bonhams in Massachusetts for nearly $1.3 million combined, according to WVXU.

Both paintings are on display at the Caza Sikes gallery ahead of the Sept. 15 auction, which begins at 10 a.m. Bidding is open worldwide as part of the house's September Estates & Collections sale.