I never thought he was the best fantasy artist, but he does go WAY back.
I never thought that Sutherland was particularly good, even compared with the downright awful David S. LaForce who also did some illustration for the first AD&D set from the late '70s. Now, I look back on their art (I still have my original books) with fondness. I'd pay good money for original prints.
What's mysterious is whatever became of David Trampier. That artist was far and away the finest of the lot working in the mathematically-complicated style of M.C. Escher.
Trampier seems to have fallen off the face of the Earth, and numerous attempts to locate him or any recent works of his have gone stone cold.
David Trampier, where the hell are you?