Magic New Art Reprints: Air Elemental

Elementals are one of Magic's oldest creature types, making their debut in Limited Edition with two mirrored pairs (each split between red and blue) that reference the four classical elements. (The Green card Force of Nature was later errata'd to be an elemental, but in its original printing, it just said "Summon Force.") Elementals are also one of Magic's best-supported tribes, with at least 40 cards of that type in each color, as of my grand Creature Type Analysis of 2014. The color wheel distribution of elementals favors Red, the only color with more than 100 such creatures at the time, followed by Green, which probably crossed that barrier between when I did that research and now, then Blue, Black, and White, in that order. But the elemental that has been reprinted the most time with unique art - which is also the most new-art reprinted creature in general - is the Blue Air Elemental.

TOP: Limited, Fifth Edition, Portal Second Age, Seventh Edition
BOTTOM: Ninth Edition, Tenth Edition, Ixalan

The first thing to notice about these seven unique-art printings of Air Elemental is that all of them but the most recent are from the less-advanced Core Sets or beginner level sets, which highlights just how entrenched the concept of elementals (and blue flying creatures in general) are in the game of Magic. The fact that Air Elementals were a staple creature in Dungeons and Dragons 15 years before Magic was even a glint in Richard Garfield's eye only goes to solidify their position in the high fantasy world. While the illustration accompanying its entry in the Advanced DnD Monster Manual is basically a tornado with the barest hint of eyes and a mouth, Richard Thomas's art for the Limited Edition version goes a long way to humanize this creature, portraying it as a coy female figure wearing a dress made out of swirly clouds. The same is true of the descriptive flavor text, which carries over into its next new-art printing in Fifth Edition, and D. Alexander Gregory's art takes it a step further, giving the Air Elemental's female form a much more photo-real representation. And maybe that bird is also part of it for some reason? Who can really know what's going on...

In Portal Second Age, Air Elemental takes a turn for the abstract, as Doug Chaffee's art shows just the outline of a winged creature with the consistency of a wisp of cloud. This is also the art that would be featured in the card's Classic Sixth Edition reprint. While Seventh Edition returns to the anthropomorphic style of the first two printings, the depiction of the elemental itself in the art by Wayne England goes in the completely opposite direction. Where once there was a playful, precocious personality, now there's a frightening monster that looks like the top half of Blanca from Street Fighter strapped to a tornado. This art would reappear in Eighth Edition, although the pun-tastic flavor text (psycho/cyclone) was replaced with a more disturbing quote, which implies that an air elemental could seek residence in an unsuspecting person's lungs. This quote would return in the Ninth Edition version, which gets new art by Nick Percival, whose rendition is the most similar to the classic DnD illustration of a storm with a face, only with a color palette and shapes reminiscent of Van Gogh's Starry Night.

By Tenth Edition, artist Kev Walker had found a balance of making Air Elemental look dangerous and imposing, but not cartoonishly so - and the quote from great writer Joseph Conrad only adds to the legitimacy. The vaguely skeletal figure with the glowing eyes would reappear in the next Core Set, Magic 2010 - where Wizards dispensed with numbered editions and started naming them after the calendar years - followed by the Jace vs. Chandra Duel Deck, and then the 2017 Welcome Deck. Tomasz Jedruszek's art for the Ixalan version of Air Elemental - its only expert level printing - features a similar visual motif, but with flavor text referencing a strategy of the River Heralds. The Blue/Green Merfolk tribe makes use of elementals housed in jade totems, similar to how Djinni are housed in lamps.


So now you have the answer to the trivia question, Which Magic creature has been reprinted the most times with new art? Of course, if you've been following this feature closely, you will be able to answer the same question, substituting creature with sorcery, instant (a tie), and nonbasic land. The list to the left will help you fill in the blanks for enchantments (a four-way tie between Pacifism and the White, Black, and Red Circles of Protection) and artifacts (another tie between Rod of Ruin and Ornithopter). Going by color, I've already written about the most new-art reprinted Red, Blue/Green (another tie), and colorless cards; completing the color wheel, we have Disenchant and Dark Ritual for White and Black, respectively.

So as Magic's 25th anniversary continues to roll along, maybe I'll continue this feature, or maybe I'll move on to other Magic-related topics; in addition to new-art reprints, I also have databases covering art on basic lands, the history of Planeswalkers (the card type, not the fictional characters), and even foreign language printings of some key phrases. Or perhaps I'll pivot back to the titular topics of this blog, Baseball and Batman. Or I could take another multi-month break from posting. Who can know!? Whatever happens on this blog, I promise that you, the readers, will be the first to find out!