Top 10: MTG x TMNT

I don’t have a lot of nice things to say about Universes Beyond as a product diluting the identity and integrity of my favorite game. But! I did work on this one, and I did find some pieces to be really fun illustrations. So here we are.

-V

10. Pizza Lands

Gaboleps

The subject of much ire and disgust in various forums (mission accomplished!), these lands are yet another in a series of homeruns from an artist whose work I now await with impatience every set. Those gooey edges can make even this herring/onion pizza look salivating to me.

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9. Super Combo

Caroline Gariba

I enjoy Caroline’s soft, clean style. The shapes on that Rocksteady are just perfect.

✦︎

8. Raphael, Ninja Destroyer

Joshua Alvarado

Don’t be fooled: a good silhouette is damn hard to do! This gesture in particular feels pitch perfect to me and lends Raphael a graphic gravitas which is a nice departure from the otherwise pervasive goofiness of the set. Joshua was also responsible for my favorite black & white Phyrexia: All Will Be One pieces. Comic book artists are just a cut above!

✦︎

7. Raph & Mikey, Troublemakers

Aaron J Riley

I just think this painting is so damn cool? Just absolutely radical, really. At card size it looks like they are both riding on the same skateboard, which only makes it more comedic and badass to me.

✦︎

6. Thomas Chamberlain-Keen

The great TCK illustrated no less than nine cards for the TMNT set. 

I couldn’t choose just one, so I included a couple!

Each more fun than the last, Thomas once again playfully showing us how it’s done.

The guy dropping his OJ in the subway lives in my head rent-free!

✦︎

5. Mutant Town Musicians

Leonardo Vincent

This card put me on to the phenomenal work of Leonardo Vincent (what a powerful art name.)

I looove the style and shapes on this card, desperately wish I could see a full res!

✦︎

4. Mona Lisa, Ever Adaptable

April Prime

Ever since April got on my radar for her design work on Bloomburrow (could write a whole separate post on this alone), I’ve been pretty obsessed. Her work stands out with superior caricatured expression, anatomy, and gesture, particularly of animal or partly-animal characters. The staging on this piece specifically is ambitious and packed with detail yet importantly remains extremely clear, which gives it an almost Norman Rockwell quality that I truly appreciate and aspire to.

✦︎

2. Leonardo, Sewer Samurai

Ryan Pancoast

If there was ever any doubt, this painting is definitive proof (and a good reminder to at least me), that a great artist is a great artist agnostic of medium. This is one of only three existing digital paintings from Ryan for Magic, since traditional paintings were not allowed for this set, but it could have fooled me! Ryan’s characteristic play of tight vs loose, gorgeous edges, not to mention absolutely masterful composition are on full display. New York feels a faraway nightmare in this beautiful and poetic rendition of a samurai/ninja clash in feudal Japan that feels much more classical fantasy and much less anachronistic than the rest of the set. Definitely a case where the name and frame don’t do the card any favors aesthetically, but the painting stands firmly on its own as one of my absolute favorites.

✦︎

2. Leonardo, Leader in Blue

Nicholas Gregory

I think I’m just a Nicholas Gregory fanboy at this point. I love the strained, sinewy tension in his figures, the abstraction and stylization of muscles and forms. Could look at this one for hours! Patiently hoping/praying the hi res gets posted some day (this is a screenshot from Instagram)

✦︎

1. Donatello, the Brains

Jason Rainville

I loved all three of Jason’s images in this set (there is a clear passion and appreciation for the IP!), but this one just takes the cake. The MacGyver'd assortment of whacky equipment on display is so thoughtful, so delightfully cowabunga, it teleported me back to my childhood reading I Spy books. The Shredder squeegee vicegripped in the clamp, its eyes bulging out, the camera plugged into the TV displaying Donatello’s goofy teeth, the red emergency button hooked up to the clamp+fire extinguisher, the multitasking gesture of Donatello himself…every square inch of this painting is filled with love, and for that I gladly award it First Place Best Winner Champion of MTGTMNT!

For the statistics-inclined among us (me), it looks like the the top 10 list included: 

- 2 Michelangelos

- 2 Leonardos

- 3 Donatellos

- 6 Raphaels

Top 10: the Art of Lorwyn Eclipsed

Lorwyn, which came out in 2007, was the set that cemented both my love of Magic and fantasy illustration all those years ago. I discovered the works of Jesper Ejsing for the first time, Omar Rayyan, Steve Prescott, Wayne Reynolds. I loved the world and the hand-painted characters that inhabited it.

Lorwyn Eclipsed, like Bloomburrow and Dominaria United before it, is a set of such overwhelming quantity of quality art that any Top 10 list is a laughable concept. Instead, I will use this space to share and celebrate many (but not all) of the pieces that caught my eye this time around. The rankings are arbitrary and ceremonial at this point. 

✦

The fact that I failed to secure a single commission for our return to the plane is genuinely one of my only regrets in life (so far).

As always, I ask only that you spend some time savoring and appreciating these lovingly crafted illustrations, (click on the images for full-screen!), with no distractions. Let them tickle your brain with delight. I will continue updating with hi-res artworks as they are shared by the respective artists.

-V

10. Vincent Christiaens

9. Justin Gerard

8. Serena Malyon

7. Mark Zug

6. Steve Prescott

5. Omar Rayyan

4. Curious Colossus

Raoul Vitale & Hayden Goodman

3. Elementals - Aldo Dominguez, Wayne Reynolds, Ryan Pancoast, Danny Schwartz, Lars Grant-West, Victor Adame Minguez

2. Ignoble Hierarch

Victor Adame Minguez

Perhaps my favorite single painting in the set, from a technical standpoint. In a lot of ways this sets the bar for my own works moving forward.

1. Jesper Ejsing

~More Beauty~