Wayfarer’s Bauble Art by David Sondered – A Summary of Events

Wayfarer's Bauble was one of the reprinted cards in The Lost Caverns of Ixalan Commander set, given a new illustration by David Sondered, who has drawn 15 Magic: The Gathering card arts so far including this one.

Lorenzo Lanfranconi Allegations

On November 19, 2023, artist Lorenzo Lanfranconi compared one of their paintings and the card side by side to show how the background of the art has been used on the card art:

@wizards_magic just want to let you know one of you artists stole one of my paintings to paste it as it is in the background of their illustration.
I don't even want to know the reason behind this. It's so stupid that deserve a prize. LOL pic.twitter.com/hxfxaGKGTj

— Lorenzo Lanfranconi (@L_Lanfranconi) November 18, 2023

Response from David Sondered

Not long after, David Sondrered released a statement on social media and claimed to have reached out to the original artist and Wizards of the Coast to settle the matter.

Statement From Wizards of the Coast

Wizards of the Coast subsequently released a statement:

We recently became aware of claims that David Sondered’s artwork on the card Wayfarer's Bauble used art created by another artist without that artist’s permission. Such misuse of art is expressly prohibited by our artist guidelines and does not reflect the values of Wizards of the Coast. As such, we will be suspending any future work with David Sondered until further notice.

Statement on Wayfarer’s Bauble

Aftermath

Since then, all social media presence by David Sondered has been deactivated and Lorenzo Lanfranconi has also released a statement to say the matter has been clarified privately.

Update
Me and this artist have already clarified this thing privately pic.twitter.com/t8MGFEfOn6

— Lorenzo Lanfranconi (@L_Lanfranconi) November 20, 2023

Other Examples

There has been other similar examples of plagiarized or stolen art in Magic: The Gathering:

Nicol Bolas by scarypet on the Mystical Archive of Crux of Fate:

Nissa Worldwaker in Core Set 15 traced from a picture of South African musician Yolandi Visser: