Melanie Reim
Melanie Reim is an award-winning illustrator with a sketchbook never far from her side. Since earning her MFA in Illustration from Syracuse University, she has illustrated for book publishers, advertising agencies, museums, magazines and major corporations. Melanie has taught drawing and illustration on both graduate and undergraduate levels both in the US and abroad. She is the driving force and chairperson of the MFA in Illustration program at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York, where she also teaches in the undergrad illustration department. Reim is very active across the institution in areas that include the Presidential Strategic Planning Council, the Dean of Students CARE Team, one of the co-creators of the President’s Council on Diversity, the Fulbright Scholar Faculty Campus rep, as well as having served as Assistant Dean for the School of Art and Design before returning to her love for being in the classroom, and of course, making art. As a documentary artist, her visual journals have been the subject of articles published out of London, UK, as well as Santo Domingo, the Dominican Republic. Her documentary work is part of the Air Force Art Collection in the Pentagon in Washington, DC and is also featured in several books about drawing, illustration, and reportage. Her work has appeared in many solo and group exhibitions, including a one-woman show at The Society of Illustrators in New York City.
When approached to participate in this amazing project, it took but just a minute to accept with great pride and appreciation. Having the opportunity to give back to those who have given so much to our country is a great honor.
The Jack of Spades is charming and protective, sometimes, devious and trickster like. Instead of his sword, he harbors the rifle, all at once necessary and often, the cause of the wounded, represented by scores of spades behind him.