German artist Nils Hamm is, undoubtedly, one of the most prolific 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Magic: The Gathering artists in the ga✱me’s history. Starting out with a rendition of Spawning Pool in Tenth Edition, Hamm came into his own with the release of th🐎e Lorwyn and Shadowmoor blocks, his signature dark, dreamy style matching their twisted fairytale aesthetic perfectly.
From there, Hamm went from strength to strength, becoming a regular contributor with pieces in almost every expansion. He now has just under 200 pieces to his name, many of which are considered classics in their own right. We’ve por🍨ed over his portfolio to bring you the ten best; artworks that define this accomplished artist’s style and range.
10 ♚ 𒈔Eyes Everywhere
Hamm’s work often explores the dreamlike, its watercolour blends replicating the feel of navigating one's own consciousness in an uncanny way. Of course, that same style and logic can also be applied to nightmares, as seen in this horribly literal vision of paranoia from Ravnica Allegiance.
The entire canvas here is a sea of eyes here, of all shapes and sizes, observing their unfortunate victim from every angle at every waking moment. The way the eyes range from solid shapes to foggy blurs is a hallmark of Hamm’s style, and an effective way of conveying the troubled🔯 mental state of the piece’s central character without the use of words.
9 Fastbond
A striking landscape piece, Hamm’s take on Fastbond is a clever illustration of the card’s mechanical function that als𝓀o happens to be a stunning piece on its own merits. Showing a Druid conjuring a mirror image of the land she walks on, we see everything from the mountains to the sun, to the streams, all cast again in the sky above.
The base landscape itself is excellent, and Hamm’s style e🦩asily conveys the natural blend and flow of nature. The slightly-off symmetry, and the central Druid figure, intentionally throw the piece off-balance, highlighting the disruption she has brought to the land through her magical meddling.
8 Bad River
For the most part, Ba🦂d River is a fairly standard take on a Dimir dual land. The combination of a water feature (in this case the titular River) with the scraggly trees of a swamp is par for the course, though the purple mushrooms and subtle purple tint on the water here do lend a distinct ethereal feeling.
Of course, what really makes the piece stand out is the giant woman’s face in the background. It’s a feature that adds immeasurably to the atmosphere of the scene, and one that has all the more impact due to the lack of a clear explanation around it. Is it a real, physical object? The reflection in the water suggests so, but we aren’t told for sure. This ambiguity, and the faded appearance of the head itself, lend the piece Hamm💜’s trademark dreamlike edge.
7 Rally The Ancestors 🔴
A uniquely white take on a reanimation spell, the desert sands 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:of the Abzan Houses take centre stage in this pඣiece. Rather than🙈 crawling out of a muddy grave, the undead soldiers here are emerging from a swirling sandstorm, the curves of the sand flowing seamlessly into their boots in one smooth, continuous motion.
The minimal use of colour here is what lends the piece its power, primarily featuring muddy yellows and sandy browns, with small areas of darkness to defin꧂e the soldiers and their su🍰rroundings. It creates a sense of unity that is not only appropriate given the ideals of the Abzan, but also visually pleasing to the eye.
6 Bale🐈ful Strix
Perhaps Hamm’s most iconic Magic illustration,♑ Baleful Strix is renowned not just f🔯or the quality of the art itself, but also for the power level of the card it’s attached to. The creature itself, a kind of artificial owl, is almost perfectly symmetrical, getting the piece off to a strong aesthetic start. From here, things get a little more loose, as the piece trails off into the vague around the edges.
You can see this clearly in the blurred tips of the owl’s wings, and in the surprisingly bright watercolour swatches that serve as a background here. The powerful contrast between the sharp, defined owl and the simple, shifting background he🅘lps both elements stand out, creating a piece that wouldn’t look out of place on a gallery wall.
5 Tapping At The Window 𓃲
Tapping into one of our primal fears, as all the best Innistrad cards do, this piece puts us immediately in the shoes of someone whose sleep is disturbed by a seemingly innocuous noise. The composition here is fairly simple, the hard angles of the window frame domin🀅ating most of it, but it’s what lies beyond the window that proves truly effective.
The shadowy, moonlit 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:forest beyond the pane is deeply at༺mospheric, and the branches reaching towards the window are so well-realis🍨ed you can practically hear them clinking on the glass. While in most horror media the revelation that it was ‘just a tree’ would bring relief, on Innistrad even the trees have a mean streak, making this piece unsettling through and through.
4 🍸 Deathless Ancient
Magic feওatures a lot of dark graves and dusty crypts, but few are as convincing as the one belonging to Ixalan’s Deathless Ancient. The base composition here is strong, with a trio of Vampire conquistadors kneeling before the Ancient, immediately contextualising their power and importance, but the real star of the show is the lighting (or lack thereof).
𒁃Other than the shafts of light coming in from the narrow windows on the left, this piece is steeped in darkness, creating an organic feel that lends an almost religious weight to the scene. Many artists would have chosen to provide artificial🍌 light elsewhere in the scene, to show things in more detail, but Hamm’s commitment to realism here makes this a strong, standout piece.
3 🍸 Delver Of Secrets/Inꦓsectile Aberration
One of the most infamous multi-format all-stars in Magic history, it’s only fitting that Delver of Secrets should have artwork that matches its power level. As with all of Innistrad’s double-faced cards, it tells 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:a story in two acts, showing🎐 an obsessive scientist meeting a tragic end in the pursui🔜t of his research.
The piece cleverly flips the🅠 scene on its axis in the second half, showing the now-monstrous Delver emerging from his cocoon on the wall of his laboratory. It also flips things tonally, from the brightly-lit lab filled with promise on the first half, to the dark, abandoned room on the second. The fact that the Delver’s face and neckpiece persist across both sides is a tragic final trace of humanity, and a reminder of the man he once was.
2 🧸 ♑ Grave Titan
One of the darkest pieces from an artist 📖who revels in darkness, Hamm’s Grave Titan is a pared-back character study that remains s♕triking to this day. The lack of a detailed background is the most conspicuous element here, giving the viewer no choice but to focus on the horror of the Titan before them.
And what a horror it is. Striding ceaselessly onward, seemingly 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:undisturbed by the Zombies and worms spilling from its abdomen, the Grave Titan keeps his gr🦄een eye fixed solely on your opponent’s destruction. The massive sword and heavy arm⛎our are excellent touches that really cement the hopelessness of facing this creature down from across the battlefield.
1 March Of Otherworldly Li💞ght
A bit of a curveball among Hamm’s gallery of nightmares, March of Otherworldly Light nonetheless features many of the hallmarks of his style. The cast of creatures assembled here all tap into the stranger side o🃏f Japanese mythology, making great use of his dreamlike style to portray their fantastical forms in a be😼lievable light.
A🐲nd while the piece does make use of bright colours and humorous characters, there’s a strong undercurrent of melancholy running through each of them, if you take a second to read their facial expressions. It’s a brilliant example of an artist maintaining their signature style and tone in a piece where doing s💜o initially seems impossible.