Arizona artist Ed Mell had a fondness for artists and their creative spirits. After he died in 2024, countless artists began sharing unique stories of drop-ins at the Mell studio for a quick visit, but there were no quick visits with the Arizona modernist. Studio tours, lunches, long discussions in front of the easel—Mell treated every person special.
Ray Dewey, Abiquiu Memory, acrylic on canvas, 18 x 25 in.“The studio is where the doors were always open. He would stop painting and spend time with people who dropped by. He was really generous with his time in that way. When you spent time with Ed, you were the most important person,” says gallery owner Rose Marie Stremel-Mell, who was married to the artist for more than 18 years. “Ed was the type of person who shared so freely with other artists. He took lots of people into the studio to see his creative process. And he loved answering questions.”
Stremel-Mell remembers her husband working with some at-risk children as part of an organization she was working with many years ago. “Ed did the tour at the studio and talked about creating. The kids start asking, ‘Would you paint a painting for us?’ Ed whipped out a little painting and they were mesmerized,” she says. “Later, when the painting dried, he had little prints made for each of the kids. That’s the kind of person he was.”
Rose Marie and Ed Mell at the Grand Canyon.
Sharing creatively, fostering the next generation of artists and celebrating Mell and his work—these are the themes of a new exhibition at the RM Gallery, formerly the Ed Mell Gallery, in Phoenix. The group exhibition, titled Reimagining a Legacy: Honoring the Artistic Inspiration of Arizona’s Native Son, brings together some of Mell’s friends as they continue to push Western modernism in ways that the artist would have certainly appreciated. The exhibition will also help launch the RM Stremel-Mell Scholarship for Art Business Impact, a new scholarship at nearby Arizona State University. The first scholarship will be announced this fall, and Stremel-Mell has pledged to donate 10 percent of every gallery sale to fund the scholarship for many years to come.
Thomas “Breeze” Marcus (Akimel/Tohono O’odham), Prometheus & the Desert, acrylic on linen, 12 x 30 in.
Artists in the November 14 show include Mel Abert, Indigo Blue, Kristine Kollasch, Billy Schenck, Thomas “Breeze” Marcus, Ray Dewey and Steve Latimer. All of them knew and respected Mell, and others had deeper connections—Latimer is Mell’s cousin, Abert was a high school and college buddy, and Dewey represented Mell when he owned Owings-Dewey Fine Art in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
“We went to North High here in Phoenix. The two of us were a couple of goofy young guys. We took the art class hoping it would be an easy credit, but we soon found out it was more engaging than we had thought, and that’s when we became fast friends,” Abert says, adding that classmates would get them confused. “People used to think we were cousins because Mel and Mell, which didn’t make any sense, but we didn’t mind. Eddie and I had different styles we worked in, but he certainly influenced me even as I went off to make work in my own way. His legacy is that his work is very unique. There are some who imitate him, but a long time ago no one was emulating him. He was doing his own thing.”
John Bell, My Planet Life, oil on wood panel, 20 x 20 in.
Latimer, Mell’s actual cousin, calls him a vital mentor in his life and career. “When I started, I looked at Western art from two different viewpoints: a photo-painting, which is to say ‘paint it like it looks,’ and then more contemporary in a way that paints it different than it actually is,” Latimer says. “Ed could paint both—realism and in more a minimalist style. It was fun going to his studio and seeing stacks of 10-by-16-inch paintings everywhere. He had a meticulous need to keep painting the West.”
Indigo Blue, Glimmer, aerosol on paper on wood panel, 18 x 18 in.
For Dewey, who only began painting seven years ago, Mell’s guidance was valuable as he began working in his studio. “I sent him some drawings because he wanted to see them, and then he started encouraging me,” Dewey says. “I like this idea of verso, which is what’s on the other side. Ed always had more to his paintings than what you saw. He really pushed the limits of what was possible.”
Kristine Kollasch, Hand in Hand Along the Road, acrylic on panel, 48 x 48 in.
Breeze first met Mell around 2009. Mell was an easel painter, and Breeze was a graffiti artist and muralist. They couldn’t have been more different, and yet they were close friends. When Mell asked the younger artist to show in a group exhibition at Ed Mell Gallery, Breeze accepted. “It was a diverse roster and I was deeply honored to be asked. I felt like Ed was looking at other Arizona artists who were working in their own way. Some of us were much younger, but that resonated with me. Today I’m doing my own art and owning my own gallery, Earth Maker Gallery, which is how Ed moved forward in his career, too,” Breeze says. “As artists we have our visual language that we work within, but that doesn’t mean we’re stuck to it. We are inspired to create many different things and we pull from inspiration all around us. It’s a mindset we work within. That’s a reflection of what Ed believed.”
Mel Abert, Blue Torro, oil on canvas board, 18 x 24 in.
Stremel-Mell hopes that this show continues conversations about her late husband’s life and legacy. “I wanted to honor him in a different way,” she says, referring to the exhibition and scholarship. “Not only was he talented artistically and a master of the landscape, and anything else he painted, but he inspired people. And he will keep inspiring people.”
The exhibition will take place November 14 at RM Gallery, in the original Ed Mell Gallery building in Phoenix. The show runs from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Stremel-Mell will also be starting a giving page for artists or collectors who want to contribute to the ASU scholarship. —
Billy Schenck, On the Road to El Paso, oil, 26 x 26 in.
Reimagining a Legacy: Honoring the Artistic Inspiration of Arizona’s Native Son
November 14, 2026, 11 a.m.-4 p.m.
RM Gallery
2337 N. 10th Street, Phoenix, AZ 85006
(602) 338-8531, www.rmartgallery.com
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