Craig Smith was born in Woodside, South Australia in 1955, and studied at the SA Institute of Arts. He is one of Australia's best-known illustrators of children's books. His artwork is witty and humorous and very popular with children. He has collaborated with many authors including Rachel Flynn in the I Hate Fridays series, a collection of stories from an imaginery school, based on the author's teaching experience, Paul Jennings's The Cabbage Patch War (1996) and The Cabbage Party Fib (1989) and Alan the Alien (2002) with Penny Hall.
His many awards include Honour Books in the Children's Book Council of Australia Picture Book of the Year Awards for Where's Mum (1992) with Libby Gleeson and Billy the Punk (1995) with Jessica Carroll.