I, as I'm sure is the case for most of you, have played magic for a long time. Since I started playing I've always been amazed, interested, and sometimes displeased with the art on Magic Cards. Thinking about the process when someone has to draw what a Thoughtseize or Force of Will should look like and coming to a final product has always interested me. Over the years I've developed my opinions on what is the best art/ my favorite art among magic cards. Personally my favorite is Stasis.
http://gatherer.wizards.com/Handlers/Image.ashx?multiverseid=202472&type=card
It certainly is not the best art by far. I love it because it's so random. Why is there what appears to be some sort of jester and a blindfolded fox on a see-saw? Why is the fox holding a ball? Or whatever that is. Why is there a easel floating between them? What's that blue stuff in the background? Is the Jester vomiting up flubbers blue cousin? How did these two beings get into this increadibly strange situation? Am I just an idiot and all of these things are more clear to everyone else? In any case it has always been my favorite art and makes me smile and laugh whenever I see it!

So, for some light hearted discussion, I want to know what your favorite art is and why? Funny, visually pleasing, personally moving, etc.

Hope you guys have a favorite just like me and look forward to hearing about them!

P.S. Please, let's not somehow devolve this into another B&R discussion where someone suggests restricting Squire because it can swing 20 times for game and someone else gets very upset because the meta is always so anti-Squire. Have some fun!

Check out the previous thread about favorite basics here.

For cards that show exactly what they do:

Personal fave:

It's pretty sweet that the prize so many sought after is a isocahedral crystal - a D20.

Rathi Dragon is pretty high on my list. It was on the first product I ever opened (75-card Tempest pack), and was a very different, sinister take on dragons that blew my 10 year old mind. It didn't hurt that a few years later I played 2 of them in Sligh and loved the card.

Nowadays, I'm pretty into the APAC Mt Fuji by Ed Beard, and play 10 of them in Legacy Burn. Beyond that, pretty partial to anything by DiTerlizzi, Brom, Tedin, Guay, and a few other big ones from the late 90s.

@poxeveryturn said in Your Favorite Card Art:

Personally my favorite is Stasis.

Stasis is my favorite card too. Not because of its art, though. But because it represent the essence of the Blue color - ability to change the fundamental rules of the game. Surprisingly, this abstract art is a work of the only professional artists who contributed to the first set. Fay Jones is a Richard Garfield aunt and she did it as favor to him. The rest of the artists were students (or something like).

I never saw any interview with Jones where she spoke about the artwork, but there is an opinion that the fox is actually Anubis who represents the kingdom of death. The pierrot (sad clown) represents tragic fate of human being doomed to die eventually. The scale symbolizes the purgatory, the process of weighting good and bad in ones life before sending him or her to heaven or hell. And a light-blue spot behind the pierrot and the scale symbolizes blue mana that the pierrot draws to freeze the scale. Why Anubis is blind-folded and is holding an orb in his hands, and what the palette and the crescent symbolize I do not remember. This touch of mysticism makes the art very cool :).

Unfortunately to my knowledge the original artwork it is not available for sale. At some point Jones gave it to her grandson who was playing Magic and where the original artwork now is a big question.

A few years ago I saw another version of the artwork some artist used for custom made playmats. It is "a bit different" but still looks cool.

And a few words about my favorite artist - Richard Kane Ferguson. His style is something that resonates with me very well (I also like Claude Monet) and I a' a big fun of his work. My favorite of his is Recall.

His works are available for sale from time to time and he has an active Facebook page. Just right now, his agent, Mark Aronowitz‎, is advertising Richard's reconstruction of Sol'kanar the Swamp King that is available for sale, if you are interested.

Squawk

Because Numerically Accurate

Thoughtseize.

Then the original Nightmare.

Gaea's Blessing by Rebecca Guay

Honorable mentions:

@prospero always loved the morphling art! Very steampunk-esque. Time and rules changes have not been kind to that card but the art is always amazing.

It's funny to me that Morphling card art was supposed to be for Clone...

@mediumsteve all the onslaught lands were really well done. I loved that set.

@mediumsteve said in Your Favorite Card Art:

It's funny to me that Morphling card art was supposed to be for Clone...

The working name for it was actually 'Tolarian Doppelganger', which is pretty cool. It was RK Post's homage to Hoover's Vesuvan. I love the piece, I just wish it was a little bigger (she's 6x8 or so). Karn is bigger, around 8x10, though it was done on some pretty flimsy paper, as opposed to the board that RK Post mounts everything on.

I wanna look at art not text so...

@tsoatt said in Your Favorite Card Art:

Thoughtseize.

Then the original Nightmare.

@serracollector said in Your Favorite Card Art:

Gaea's Blessing by Rebecca Guay

This would have to be my honorable mention...

@poxeveryturn the other Avon forest in Onslaught is beautiful, but the Matson forest is one of my least favorites... can't win 'em all.

@mediumsteve yea the one with the sun shining through the line of trees, it is very pretty.
The Matson one was a very different take on it. It was definitely a different style. It's not as aesthetically pleasing I agree.

Perhaps it's nostalgia for a deck I loved but I think Entreat is pretty great. Terminus is good too but it's hard to see all the detail.