Fantasy Pictures

See Fantasy Art for so-called 'fine artists' working in fantasy.

Sulamith Wulfing

Sulamith Wulfing (1901 - 1989) was a German artist whose fairy tale illustrations became the definitive version for many years. Her 1953 fantasy pictures that illustrate The Little Mermaid are characteristic of her 'look'.

She specialized in angels, fairies and animal figures. Most of her art is deeply spiritual in origin and image.

Her estate produces a 'Sulamith Wulfing Angels calendar' yearly that remains a best seller 16 years after her death. Her fantasy pictures are available on greeting cards, art prints and other media as well.

Frank Frazetta

If your fantasy story needs mighty thewed warriors and scantily clad lithesome sorceresses, then you need pictures by Frank Frazetta. His men are mighty, his women are positively pneumatic, and they are usually wearing very little.

If your literary work is sword'n'sorcery, space opera or other lavishly dramatic and overwrought opus of humanity, fantasy demon- or dragon-kind in raw struggles against nature, evil and bad hair, all while looking lust-worthy and incredibly healthy, you need Frazetta art.

Michael Whelan

One of the most prolific cover artists working today, Michael Whelan has a way of picking his projects. Our tastes must be very similar, because whenever I see a book with Whelan cover art, I'm pretty sure I'm going to like the book.

His fantasy pictures have graced the covers of Anne McCaffrey's Dragonriders books, Sean Russell's Initiate Brother series, Robin Hobb's Farseer Trilogy, and many more. Unlike many cover artists, who produce pictures of blonde princesses for a book about a princess with black hair, Whelan clearly reads the books he illustrates.

One of his most amazingly detailed and stunning pictures of fantasy origins, from Robin Hobb's Assassin's Apprentice is below: