Magic: The Gathering™ is not just a game for people who don’t have basic personal hygiene, it’s also a game with a rich tradition of wonderful art. Here are a few of my favorite artists and pieces in the game.

Let’s start with the boring stuff. Yes, I like Rebecca Guay (everyone likes Rebecca Guay). My favorite piece by her is Moment’s Peace. We can lump in Sam Guay with her too, fairly or not (I like Glen Elendra’s Answer and Seam Rip). To continue the boring picks, I like lots of John Avon‘s pieces, especially lands. In particular, his cycle of Mountains from Mirage is great and #346 is my favorite basic land.

To continue with classic artists, my favorite is probably Kev Walker. The “cycle” of Wrath of God and Damnation goes absurdly hard (and you could add in Obliterate as a third part of the cycle, which has great flavor text to match). I wish there were a printing of these with the centered text like the 5ED version of Wrath. Some of my other favorite pieces by Kev Walker are Late to Dinner and Savor.

Now to some less classic picks. Though he mostly illustrates draft chaff, Jeremy Wilson‘s pieces have a strong style with simple framing and very evocative use of highly contrasting colors. Favorites of his include Desculpting Blast (my personal pick for “unsummon with upside” even though I know Into the Flood Maw is a better card and “Gift a Tapped Fish” is a great line of rules text), Jaya’s Firenado (I can’t really say anything nice about this card outside a limited context), Bone Splinters, and Dreams of Steel and Oil (these last two are at least borderline playable in constructed formats).

With only four cards from a single set, Elliot Lang doesn’t have much under his belt, but all four pieces are very neat, with my favorite being Mind Roots. I hope we will see more from him.

Another favorite among more recent artists is Serena Malyon. Though she’s mostly done cards in non-standard frames, there are several pieces of hers that are still great. Beyond the Quiet continues the tradition of sweepers having amazing art (and flavor text), though at {3}{W}{W} this one is priced out of constructed play. I also love her Spectacular Skywhale art, which was lots of fun in the narrowly-playable Prismari aggro deck in that draft format.

Eli Minaya has some cool pieces. I like Honor and Pym Particles, the latter of which proves that even in UB sets artists can impart their own idiosyncratic styles.

To mention some non-standard frames, Rovina Cai has some really cool pieces, though mostly in the STA frame. My favorite card in that frame, though, is Lenka Šimečková‘s Crackle with Power, which is one of my pet cards. I hope she gets to do some cards in standard frames in future sets. For a couple more cards with non-standard frames: Etyan Zana‘s Invocation Entomb; Esuthio‘s WOT Blood Moon; Matteo Bassini‘s EOS Mana Confluence; and a bunch of cards by Dominic Mayer, including his STA pieces, the SPG Ultimatum cycle, the SPG Prismatic Ending, and this promo Get Lost.