Quoted from PinsRfun:

In terms of licensed themes, I would take modern Stern photoshop art over DataEast hand drawn crap (JP, TFTC, LAH, etc). I avoided DE pretty much because their art was horrible.

Quoted from JoeGrenuk:

It's weird that in a topic of pinball art, 50-some posts, no one has mentioned the 1950's. I remember having a conversation at Expo at the Ramada where a group of us were lamenting the decline of the quality of pinball art from the 50's to the 60's to the 70's. That's the same 70's that a lot of posters here have held up as the "iconic" good stuff. So, yeah, tastes change.
One poster said that the reason for crappy art is: "It's 100% time and cost driven". I don't know about that. Look at 1954. Gottlieb put out 13 games that year, ALL of them with art by one guy, Roy Parker, and ALL of them designed by one guy, Wayne Neyens. No computers, no copy machines, no CAD, no CNC, and every playfield and backglass was screened. I think that addresses the "time driven" problem.
On the cost part...a game back then cost $250, NIB. The 3.6% annual inflation since then takes the $250 up to $2200 in today's dollars. So, at $6500, the cost of a new pin today has increased three times the rate of inflation. I think that addresses the "cost driven" problem.
I understand that games are more complex today, but so is technology on design, engineering, and production aspects. But this is a thread about art. And the fact is that Parker churned out more than a game's worth of great, iconic art every month.
Conclusion: What we need today are artists that are better, and work faster