Errant Minion

What the heck is going on here? I stumbled across one in my collection and was like, "huh?" I mean, I like abstract stuff but this is pretty far even for an old card.

The shadow is the minion. Clearly, it is not doing what you want it to, and thus hurting you. You can pay mana to "keep and eye on it" and prevent it from causing you pain. The wavy lines around the shadow depict discord and trouble. The maze-like design on the ground depict the minion not following the plan you set for it in a straightforward fashion.

That's a shadow?

A shadowed figure. It's a person in a dark cloak being viewed from a distance.

Suuuuuuuuuuuure

It has a defined head, shoulder, arm, and body shape. What more do you want?

All I see is a hamster head.

With the shadow being the nose?

Pretty much all of Harold McNeill's card art is like that. See Enduring Renewal, Forgotten Lore, Knight of the Mists, and Nether Void. I particularly like his Tempest Circles of Protection--his work is well-suited to that kind of abstraction.

...I wonder if we'll ever see him again in card art. It'd need to be somewhere with definite gothic sensibilities, and probably on some kind of abstract enchantment.

I do miss some of the different kinds of art styles you used to see. It's not that I don't like the new art, it's just that I did appreciate the variety they used to have.

I know it was less consistent and on-brand, but it did keep things interesting.

I love stuff like this, but this one in particular was hard to figure out. When you actually hold the card in front of you with the old printing methods, it's kinda blurry and weird. Very gray.