Melanie Reim

Biography

Melanie Reim is an award-winning artist and illustrator, with a sketchbook never far from her side. After earning her MFA in Illustration from Syracuse University, she began a successful freelance career with a diverse range of clients before pursuing her passion for teaching.

At the Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT) in New York City, Reim enjoyed a rich and rewarding academic career, attaining the rank of Full Professor and serving in both the School of Art and Design and the School of Graduate Studies. She is the founder and former Chairperson of the MFA in Illustration program and concluded her tenure as Associate Dean for the School of Art and Design.

A Fulbright Scholar, Reim has spent over two decades teaching and collaborating with students and communities in the Dominican Republic. Her reportage illustration has been featured in numerous books, articles, and exhibitions, and her documentary work is included in the Air Force Art Collection at the Pentagon. Her drawings have been recognized by the Society of Illustrators (NY), SILA, American Illustration, and Latin American Illustration, among others. She has appeared on NHK Television Japan, documented the 2016 U.S. presidential election, and served as Artist-in-Residence for The Year of the Bird at the Cincinnati Zoo and AIR Vallauris in France.

Named the 2018 Distinguished Educator in the Arts by the Society of Illustrators, Reim continues to teach and practice life drawing and illustration in her midtown Manhattan studio, as well as nationally and abroad. Her first monograph, Different & the Same: My Drawings and Stories of Women Around the World (Sketcher Press, 2023), celebrates her lifelong commitment to storytelling through drawing. She is a Signature Member of NAWA (The National Association of Women Artists) and a member of the New York Artists Circle.

Artist statement

An expressive, stylized line and an acute command of the figure define my work. I draw inspiration from Picasso, Rico Lebrun, Ben Shahn, Romare Bearden, Matisse, and other master draftsmen and painters. Above all, the human figure remains my greatest teacher—a sublime machine that continues to thrill and challenge me. I aim to capture the narrative of a pose, the nuance of an expression, the energy of a gesture, and the undeniable presence of the people before me.

What begins with the model in the studio often expands into on-location reportage. My ever-present sketchbook is the vessel through which what I see and experience is absorbed into my personal narrative. It holds fleeting moments that often evolve into larger works—portraits of Dominican weavers, beachgoers from my family’s history, or scenes from my travels around the world.

My pieces are layered combinations of oil, acrylic, collage, pastel, charcoal, conté, and ink. I work with painted papers, torn prints, and broken pastels—materials transformed by brushes, rollers, palette knives, and even the smudge of a finger. No two paths to resolution are ever the same. The landscape, too, shares the mystique of the figure, and I interpret it with the same immediacy and spontaneity that drive my drawings. My recent plein air practice merges design, line, and mark-making into painted observations of place.

Throughout my journeys, I have been drawn to the stories of working women—a connection that inspired my lifelong project, Another Woman’s Life. Many of these stories appear in my monograph, Different & the Same: My Drawings and Stories of Women Around the World (Sketcher Press, 2023).