Magic Art by Terese Nielsen: 10th Edition

Legacy Weapon

ART DESCRIPTION:
Color: None (artifact)
Location: n/a
Action:
This card represents the Legacy Weapon, the culmination of the
planeswalker Urza’s centuries-long efforts to defeat Yawgmoth. The
weapon is a combination of many different artifacts:
1. the Weatherlight itself
2. the silver golem Karn
3. Squee’s Toy
4. Null Rod
5. Skyshaper
6. Touchstone
7. Juju Bubble
8. Thran Forge
9. Thran Tome
10. Eye of Ramos
11. Heart of Ramos
12. Horn of Ramos
13. Skull of Ramos
14. Tooth of Ramos
15. Power Matrix
16. Mightstone (this can be in Urza’s eye socket)
17. Weakstone (this can be in Urza’s eye socket)

The
super-important parts are the Weatherlight and Karn. The Legacy Weapon
is formed by Karn sort of sitting in/fusing with the Weatherlight’s
engine room, with the other artifacts around him and inside his
thoracic cavity. That’s not visually interesting though, so what
we want is a ‘movie poster’ approach to the event. nice and surface
aware, a non-linear montage of the items/events. here’s a suggestion as
a jumping off point:

Karn faces us in an almost sitting posture,
his back to something thats believably the engine of the ship. he is
holding in his hands The severed head (its alive, not gory) of Urza,
whos eye sockets contain the power stones (the head is also facing us).  The
stylishly composited around karn/urza are the various gems baubles
tomes etc. all against a ‘wallpaper’ of the profile of the weatherlight.

You could also play with an energy burst motif, as it is an energy weapon.  Just play, have fun, design, give us something solid and deliberate and it will be good.

Speaking about Holy Strength/Unholy Strength:

"These two were fun and challenging… I got to show total contrast in look and
meaning.  Light white magic vs. dark scary magic.  Sword pointing up,
light coming down.  Warrior in both getting more powerful.  So, how should I symbolically show each getting bigger and stronger in a spell sort of
way?  I like the ones where I get to do weird little symbols, shapes and
patterns.  The shapes, patterns and swirls disappear and reappear… not sure what
they are. 

I can do these in a sort of hypnotic state. I play, I noodle . . . and I got to put gold leaf in both of these, so that automatically
means they were fun!  I ended up selling Holy Strength alone, and Jeremy got mad
at me… he said they should have been sold in a set.  These 2 pieces are two of
the few that I’ve done in a while that I put all the time in that I
wanted… I didn’t look at them and think, "If I’d only I’d had another day…"

Holy Strength

TITLE: Holy Strength

SIZE:
2 1/16" (52mm) wide x 1 1/2" (38mm) tall

ART DESCRIPTION:
Color:  White Spell
Location:  N/A
Action:
Show the meager but armored torso (chin to belt maybe) of a male
warrior (costume should feel ‘white-aligned’).  He is holding his sword
straight up in front of his body, both hands on the hilt.  A stronger,
bare torso is being built around his own by angel feathers, which are
circling into the picture in a stylish way.  He is strongly lit with
holy light from ‘heaven’.  This should be a bookend illo with Unholy
Strength (MV ID# 129780).
Focus:  The torso and its indications of holy strength
Mood:  Heaven-sent muscle

Unholy Strength

ART DESCRIPTION:   
TITLE: Unholy Strength
SIZE:
2 1/16" (52mm) wide x 1 1/2" (38mm) tall

ART DESCRIPTION:
Color:  Black Spell
Location:  N/A
Action:
Show the meager but armored torso (chin to belt maybe) of a male
warrior (costume should feel ‘black-aligned’).  He is holding his sword
straight down in front of his body, both hands on the hilt.  A
stronger, more horrible, bare torso is being built around his own by
monstrous teeth and jawbones, which are circling into the picture in a
stylish way.  He is strongly up-lit with infernal light from ‘hell’.
This should be a bookend illo with Holy Strength (MV ID 129594).
Focus:  The torso and its indications of unholy strength
Mood:  Strength granted from below