MtG Artists: Daarken

Daarken’s art first appeared in the set Future Sight, along with another favourite of mine, Nils Hamm. In this case, these were ‘futureshifted’ artists. Wizards knew their work was going to appear in future sets, and so Future Sight acted as a kind of preview. It wasn’t just cards from the future that were shown in this set.

Since that time, we’ve seen around 100 cards illustrated by Daarken, and I look forward to 100 more! Here are five of my favourites, and as usual it was difficult to select only five from the cards available.

1. Sarkhan Vol

Sarkhan Vol was the first planeswalker art I saw that was not illustrated by Aleksi Briclot. This confirmed in one powerful image that yes, other artists are capable of illustrating this new card class. Also, that Wizards are capable of creating more interesting characters for us to follow from set to set.

2. Harbor Serpent

I like this art a lot, not only for itself but for what it represents. The art quality in Magic has increased so much that even ‘filler’ cards like this one (useful in Limited play, and then only sometimes) has art that qould be considered marquee on many other products.

3. Fetid Heath

This land from Eventide took that set’s shadowy, overcast look and embodied it.

4. Korlash, Heir to Blackblade

This legendary character was one of Daarken’s debut pieces in Future Sight. It remains a favourite of many players.

5. Sarkhan, the Dragonspeaker

With this art we have come full circle from the first piece. This is the most recent incarnation of Sarkhan, years after the first. Taken from his adopted home of Jund and sent around the multiverse, Sarkhan has become unhinged. Now his is back to his homeland of Tarkir, trying to answer the whispering voices n his head.

See the artist’s webpage, or view all Magic cards by Daarken.