D&D General Art that defined D&D for you

[Sacrosanct]

What pieces of D&D art over the years represents the defining moment of D&D for you? Not the best, or technically superior art, but what the scene actually represents. This has to be up there. I started in 1981, so my D&D formative years was very much "Hey! I'm a knight in shining armor! What's that? It's not all duels on the battlefield or fighting dragons, but a lot more of delving into dungeons and and getting swarmed by icky things?"

I loved it

 

[Sacrosanct]

Bonus pieces:

 

[Eltab]

The guy climbing up on the 'frog-demon' idol to pull the big faceted gems out of its eyes.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

 

[Oofta]

That's tough, because I think I have two.

For the serious/heroic side how I imagined my PC

What our group was like most of the time

 

[dave2008]

There are many, including the ones in the OP, these had an influence on me as well:

 

[dave2008]

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I love those, but since they so "good" I feel they don't meet the OP requirement: "Not the best, or technically superior art, but what the scene actually represents. "

 

[jmartkdr2]

I'm going to have to agree with @doctorbadwolf : Dragonlance was my first real foray into all of what DnD could be. I'd played with my older brothers before, but the total experience didn't really click until I read the novels.

 

[WayOfTheFourElements]

It'd have to be the Holmes Basic cover for me.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

Sigh, someone had to post that darn Giant Spider picture. So terrifying. If I were an adventurer and saw that, that'd be my last dungeon crawl.

For me, undead and skeletons are a formative part of my D&D experience. Undead remain amongst my favorite monsters:

But I would be remiss in not including some BECMI line art: