FanArt_ink.Spell

MTGinktober signs up for Day 4, "Spell," starring Rubinia Soulsinger, who is all too eager to rub a spelling error in Nicol Bolas's patheitc face.

The obvious move was to do some mage or shaman kind of character busting a magical move, but in my typical self-sabotaging tendency, I wanted to see if I could do something with actual spelling in Magic rather than mystical spelling. Enter the infamous typo from Wit's End, where the big bad, Nicol Bolas, tries to taunt some nameless Planeswalker and totally punts it, which is extra painful because he happens to be lecturing his opponent on arrogance and pride. I then thought of Rubinia for the starring role because of how her updated art shows her as apparently some type of magical signer--but her name actually indicates she's a singer. So the newer Cynthia Sheppard art featuring a document and quilled up Soulsinger might have been a reference to how often her name's misspoken or misspelled, but regardless, it felt like great casting for a spell-centric role.

Fun Facts: I based my interpretation of Rubinia on both the newer art version and the original Rob Alexander take, particularly the leafy background on the right side of the image--the left side's waterfall and trees came from the Cynthia Sheppard remix.

Easter Eggs: While the word "patheitc" is an obvious reference to M13's Wit's End, meanwhile the shadow of Nicol Bolas looming over a central figure is a toss to the original Cruel Ultimatum, which now makes two references I've done to that art.

This idea actually came together relatively at the last minute--after my initial research phase concluded--and originally I was going to do a jam of all the Spellhearts that are floating around out there, likely headlined by Adeliz, the Cinder Wind, but maybe we'll get to implement that concept somewhere else down the line. That said, as you can see from the thumbnail, rather than a shadow, Rubinia was originally going to be sitting or standing on Nicol Bolas's head. But upon gathering references, it didn't look like his head structure would lend itself well to that in this composition.

Not normal,

Reuxben