Fantasy Art Friday: Dragon's Lair by Ralph Horsley

Ralph's DeviantArt Page

Who doesn't love a good piece of fantasy art? Being someone who has always preferred the more "visual" mediums of art, I love looking at images of the fantastical and its always nice to find a cool picture that ends up inspiring you to either write a story or add something new to a future game session. Because of this, I've decided to occasionally use my Friday post (probably every other week) to showcase an image or artist that I find interesting or just pretty darn cool.

Which brings us to our first image by Ralph Horsley, a freelance illustrator based in Leeds in the UK who has been working in the fantasy art field for over two decades. Horsley is one of my favorite fantasy artists and I love his particular style of embracing the fantastical without going overboard with it. Also, his pieces always manage to inspire me in one way or another.

"Dragon's Lair" is a cover illustration for the Pathfinder Campaign Setting sourcebook Dragons Unleashed and depicts the two Iconics Seltyiel the Magus and and Kyra the Cleric fighting a black dragon who is guarding its hoard of treasure. This image perfectly captures that classic fantasy art trope of some adventurers taking on a dragon. Every time I look at this picture, I just want to go back to that old genre trope and have my players fight one of the scaly bastards. I also love how this picture isn't set in some dark dungeon or on top of a high mountain, but what looks to be a swamp, which is a nice change of pace with this kind of image.

Question Time: What is your favorite "adventurers fighting a dragon" image? Why do you like that particular image so much? Leave your answer in the comments below.