At tor.com, an interview with Ted Naismith, the artist for lots of the art we all think of as quintessential Middle-Earth visual images.
My favorite . . . surely everyone’s favorite?
The whole post is well worth a minute of your time, for the lovely collection of artwork as well as the interview.
UPDATE: Maureen’s comment made me immediately google Alan Lee Tolkien. Here, for those who might like a sample, is the cover to The Fall of Gondolin:
Fine, I have to admit, this is pretty great too. To be even-handed, and since I stumbled across it really fast, here’s an article about Alan Lee.
I still favor Ted Naismith’s work. Now I’m going to probably spend more time than is strictly reasonable looking at their work and trying to work out why.