Asa Lynn "Ace" Powell (April 3, 1912 – January 25, 1978) was an American painter, sculptor, and etcher of genre scenes and imagery relating to indians, cowboys, horses, and wildlife.
While in his early 20s, Powell took a job as a wrangler on the Bar X5 ranch near Babb, Montana, and handled horses for the Glacier Park concessionaire.
He took a few private lessons from the great master, but for the most part Powell was a self-taught artist through trial and error.
[2] When Powell's first wife Helena—who was born in Smolensk, Russia, in 1908—died during the bitterly cold winter of 1941, he joined the Army Air Corps and worked in a defense plant.
In 1952 he married fellow artist Nancy McLaughlin and the couple made their home in Hungry Horse, a few miles east of Bad Rock Canyon, and operated a combination studio and gallery.
[4] It was during this period that Powell gained much of his reputation and began to garner a following of collectors who would patronize him for the rest of his career.
He subsequently took a correspondence art course and learned to organize the things he had been taught over the years into formal presentations.
Impressed by the artist’s work, they commissioned Powell on the spot to produce a large 4x8 foot mural painting featuring Lake McDonald.
Long after the buyers were deceased, a deal was consummated in 2013 by a partnership consisting of Freedom Bank in Columbia Falls, Glacier Park National Fund, and Kalispell art dealer Kevin Moore to buy the painting at an undisclosed price from the unnamed couple’s daughter who wished to remain anonymous and still lived in Cincinnati.
After being on display for a time in the Freedom Bank lobby, the painting was eventually donated to the Glacier National Park Fund and was relocated to Lake McDonald Lodge.