Lady Justice is an immediately recognizable motif. She dons long, flowing robes and holds two scales that hang in the balance. Her origins as a personification of morality date back to ancient times: in Greece, she was known as the goddess Themis, and the Roman emperor Augustus introduced her into the pantheon as Justitia. Today, Lady Justice often serves as a representative of fair legal systems. In an illustration for Jessica Wapner’s Scientific American article “What Happens when People with Dementia Commit Crimes?,” Exeter, United Kingdom–based illustrator Mark Smith takes this symbol and complicates it—his drawing shows us looking at Lady Justice from below, our gaze centered on one of her scales. At first, this seems like a typical depiction of Lady Justice, but Smith subverts our preconceptions of this figure by placing her behind shattered glass.

“I think his storytelling has gotten to be remarkable,” says Michael Mrak, the former creative director for Scientific American. “His ability to find unique angles on a subject is astounding to me. A piece on how the justice system deals with a person with dementia could be very boring and a hard subject to portray, but he found a way to use the idea of the world being out of focus as a potent metaphor for this impairment, powerfully showing how it isolates a person in court. Taking a ‘normal’ point of view and then imposing an editorialist idea shows how to really grow as an artist. The ‘twist’ really displays the intelligence behind a work.”

This illustration—and many of Smith’s others—uses unexpected angles to weave compelling narratives about everything from the rise of extremist groups in Texas suburbs to how college can help students succeed. He has received numerous accolades from different groups, including American Illustration, the New York Society of Illustrators, and the World Illustration Awards. He has also contributed to publications like ESPN The Magazine, Harper’s Magazine, Rolling Stone, The New Yorker, TIME and Vanity Fair.

Smith has had a long and, at times, tumultuous relationship with drawing. As a child, he liked to make uncolored pencil sketches and developed his signature line work early on. However, he never seriously considered pursuing a career in illustration.

“I kind of got fed up with drawing because there was never any kind of point to it for me when I was young,” Smith says, reflecting on his journey as an illustrator. “I was brought up as a working-class boy, and I never really believed you could make a living out of it.”

After giving up art as a teenager, he continued to pursue his other hobbies—like skateboarding and surfing—and found different occupations to support himself.

“I worked in loads of different jobs,” Smith told 3x3 magazine in 2024. “I’ve managed a record store; worked in a photo lab; [and] been a stagehand for a traveling theater, a self-employed gardener, a postman and a motorcycle courier, among quite a few other ill-fated career choices.”

But none of these occupations seemed to stick. Smith speculates that “if I weren’t an illustrator, I suppose I’d still be jumping from job to job.” Looking for a greater sense of purpose in his career, he ultimately made his way back to illustration in his mid-thirties at his wife Pippa’s urging.

“I was 36 when I went back and studied illustration at university,” Smith explains. “I had a period from my early twenties until my early thirties when I wasn’t drawing at all. Then, in my early thirties, I started drawing again because my wife runs a nightclub where they show indie bands and punk bands. I started doing posters for them, and I would paint them, and from there, she kind of encouraged me to go study illustration.”

Smith enrolled in Plymouth University’s illustration program to further hone his skills. In school, he matured as a draftsman, drawing inspiration from various artists. These included Mark Tansey, whose work Smith describes as “a perfect and profound blend of narrative and conceptual,” and Frank McCarthy, whose poster for Once Upon a Time in the West is, as Smith says, “nothing short of awesome. Looking at that makes me want to create images.”

As he broadened his oeuvre, Smith also referenced several golden-age illustrators, such as Bernie Fuchs and Bob Peak, and other media like films to inform his compositional choices and color combinations. Movies like Alfred Hitchcock’s North by Northwest and Joel and Ethan Coen’s remake of The Ladykillers had a profound impact on Smith’s sense of narrative when he began designing his own movie posters and book covers. The budding artist’s abilities gained recognition, and publications began commissioning him for his work.

“My first job came while I was still in the final year of my degree—it was for YOU Magazine from The Mail on Sunday,” Smith told Salzman International in an interview. “[At the time], I had set up a basic online presence … and then bought one of the Association of Illustrators’s mailing lists and started sending out samples to [art directors] in the editorial field. I’d get maybe ten responses for every hundred emails, but that was enough to encourage me to keep it up. Then, I got the email from Linda Boyle at YOU Magazine, commissioning me for a full page and a spot image for a story about how divorce affects children.”

After this first gig, he continued to build his portfolio and collaborate with other clients, and ultimately, he decided to seek representation from an agency.

“Mark first contacted me about representation in 2009,” says Richard Salzman, Smith’s agent. “I run a boutique operation, and as a rule, I don’t initiate relationships with illustrators. I have probably signed only one out of every 200 artists who have approached me over the last several decades and only four in the past five years or so. I have occasionally signed emerging artists who were still developing their talents, but Mark came to me as a fully formed illustrator.”

Now, Smith regularly contributes pieces to magazines, books, newspapers and ad campaigns. In the morning, he usually drinks a cup of coffee with his wife, eventually making his way to his home studio. He used to have a larger studio about two miles away, but recently, he decided to switch to his home studio because it was more convenient and cost-efficient. When he’s working on a project, Smith renders drawings in Photoshop, so he usually starts his studio time making studies on his tablet. Typically, he will allocate at least two days for sketches, making preliminary drawings on the first day and more refined ones on the second. He is meticulous about his creative process, and sometimes he submits three images for every one he’s commissioned to do.

“Mark creates article illustrations based on a brief I send him at the start of the project,” says Avionne Christie, the senior designer in the creative services engagement and reporting team of Trust magazine. “While I personally love Mark’s art style, what I value most about him is his creative thinking, which makes it so much easier for smooth collaboration. I commission him with minimal visual direction, and he reads the articles and gives us three visual options for the illustrations. He usually connects the pieces, so there is a flow through the illustrations that pulls the reader through the article.”

Smith’s pieces certainly have a way of grabbing the reader’s attention. For example, his drawing for writer Zach Dorfman’s Rolling Stone piece “Surfer, Scholar, Jihadist, Spy” depicts a man standing near two surfboards. Two plumes of smoke trail from the tops of the surfboards, reminding us of the two World Trade Towers just before they fell. The result is a surreal scene that juxtaposes the cerulean quiet of the beach with a sense of impending doom.

“Mark manages to lend a filmic eye to his illustrations,” says Sheri Gee, a former creative director who has worked with Smith on many projects. “I found him to be a master at composition, able to use his imagination to frame any scene for maximum drama.”

It’s this sense of theatrics—along with the complexity of Smith’s visual cues—that distinguishes his illustrations from those of other artists. Still, he sets his work apart at a time when technology is making images easier and easier to create.

“Something I’ve noticed in illustration is that there are a lot of [drawings made in] a very simplistic style with flat colors and very flat figures,” says Smith. “AI can copy that so easily, swamp the market and maybe kill that style off. [Perhaps] there will be a desire for more intricate [drawings with] a more tactile approach.”

Though Smith contends with these growing challenges to the field of illustration, his definitive application of line and his ability to translate text into images help differentiate his work in a world where images are omnipresent.

“As beautiful and captivating as Mark’s style is, I think his unique point of view is the most significant feature of his artistry,” says Salzman. “Adding to that, he is just an all-around nice guy—a real mensch, as my father would’ve said—and it is an unbeatable combination.” ca